So I have two PN’s that a user issued to a job using Mass Issue however they were issued with a blank lot number. Now that “should” not possible because the part is lot tracked and had a qty on hand so tracking could not have been disabled. In addition to those transactions on the 8th, another one on the 18th happened to one of the same PN’s for 1 piece during a standard Issue to MFG transaction. It was once again issued with no lot number.
Epicor is getting me a fix to correct this but I was wondering if anyone else has had this happen and what they found regarding how it was even able to happen.
Now this isn’t a common occurrence but to have this happen on two part numbers on one day, and then one of those PN’s again 10 days later, during a different transaction type and user, is just really strange.
Well we figured out why they’ve been able to continue to issue to that blank lot number… The initial creation of it we can’t figure out, but when a user is using the Issue Material module, when they open up the Lot Number search box it’s the first one on the list because it’s a negative “on hand qty” and they are not paying attention to it and just hitting the enter key twice to search and pick the top lot number. This results in them increasing the negative value for that blank lot number, and why they don’t get a “A valid lot number is required” prompt.
Still seems odd that Epicor doesn’t notice that as an invalid number.
I wish I knew how Mass Issue was able to create that blank lot number in the first place.
That’s a good question, I did not do enough research when it happened to determine if it was truly a blank entry, or if there was a phantom space character. I wouldn’t think it would be a space because I feel like there would have been another window that would have popped up to create that lot number, and I also didn’t think you could create a lot number from the Mass Issue screen. I was under the assumption that you could only pick from an existing lot.
I will restore that DB from the 21st and see if I can duplicate it that way, and verify if it’s truly devoid of all characters or if it’s a space. They gave me a fix file that deleted the transactions and then I just did a Bin recalculation to get the qty’s back to where they should be.
However when in Lot Tracker if you select that lot number you can then highlight that field that makes it look like there is a space… I need to do more testing.
Ok, I’m not totally crazy… you can’t create lot numbers from the Mass Issue screen… I just tried doing a Mass Issue on the problem job in our training DB with all the same lot numbers that were used before but this time entering just a space in the fields that I wanted it to create this phantom blank lot number and I got this error, which is what I would expect to see. So unfortunately this instance of a blank lot number being created goes unsolved. I hate it when stuff like this happens.
Ran into this one today, this post helped fix the issue! Thanks!
We updated some parts to lot tracked recently. Transfer orders that were in-transit while the part was updated to lot tracked are received into inventory with a blank/empty lot number. DMR’s that are re-opened and accepted to stock will also have a blank/empty lot number. These are the 2 instances we found where the lot number is set to blank and basically locks the lot/parts up.
To get around it, we were able to “create” a new lot number with a space (" ") as the lot number using the quantity adjustment module. After doing that, the blank/empty lot gets linked to the " " lot. It still can’t be adjusted out from quantity adjustment, but after creating the " " lot we were able to issue the part to a job, then return the material to inventory using the real lot number.
There is a way to be able to take a blank lot number and give it a value. Im not sure if the scenario is the same or if it would work here but…
You need to use the Refresh PartBin QOH from PartTran and the Refresh Part Quantities and Allocations screens. I vaguely remember these from doing this at my last company. Once running them the part would show up in Quantity Adjustment with something generic like “Blank” that was able to actually be dealt with.
Interesting suggestions for fixing the issue… I am going to try what Zerobertson mentioned and see if that would have fixed our issue. I have a hard time believing it’s that easy to correct.
The sad part is, it still doesn’t explain how in the heck they were able to create this blank lot number.
Ok, so Zerobertson your solution does work somewhat… Or at least it fixed the 7pcs that were issued during the first mistake. Those were given a “unknown” lot number. However since I have people who just bang on keyboards to issue parts, 5 pieces were issued from the material issue screen and they selected the blank lot number during that process, oddly it left those transactions alone since I’m assuming they were “valid” transactions against a blank lot? It doesn’t make much sense on why it did what it did… SO if I had run this refresh program when the mistake first happened I would have been able to adjust that “unknown” lot out.
Adam, I’m not able to create a lot number that is just a space… it does not recognize that as a valid lot number. You can see here I’m trying to adjust that -5 out and I did a Lot search and selected the one that looks to be blank… and when selected if you highlight the lot field it shows a space… however it error’s out when you click on adjust.
Yes, the quantity adjustment module will still throw an error for that lot number. But it is still created, and after it’s created I was able to see it on the “lot search”, and then I was able to select it on the “Issue Material” module (where it doesn’t error like qty adjustment module).
Here is what I was running into before I created the " " lot:
The empty lot qty in inventory was not appearing on my lot search until I created the " " lot. After creating the (invalid) " " lot, that blank lot qty gets linked to it and I am able to select it in the lot search:
Well the initial transaction was re-tagged as Unknown after running the refresh partbin QOH from PartTran as you suggested. However the transactions that were performed after that blank lot was created, using material issue, were not re-tagged as anything so they still showed up as blank, or space.
The whole problem has been fixed by Epicor by deleting the bad transactions and then me running the refresh so currently this isn’t still haunting me. The good thing to know is the fact that if this happens again I can quickly run a refresh and re-tag the bad lot numbers to remove them.
