The Often Forgotten Way of Handling Blanket Orders

On almost every project I work on in Dynamics 365 for Finance & Operations, there is a requirement to handle scheduled deliveries on a PO/SO or handle blanket type orders. In previous versions of the system users had the option to choose order type ‘Blanket order’ on both the PO and the SO creation form, however since Dynamics AX 2012, this option is gone.

Well, it is easy – you say. You can just create several lines on the order and adjust the delivery dates accordingly on each line. And you would be right, except for a couple things.

The first one is the manual data entry. For companies dealing with orders with a huge number of scheduled deliveries, it’s a time-consuming process to enter them all manually, and with every entry the potential for user errors and typos increases. And what about instances when the customer service rep is on the phone with the customer while entering the order? Surely they cannot expect the customer to be on the phone for as long as it takes to enter the complete order?

Another very important aspect of the scheduled deliveries or blanket type orders is pricing and discounts. I have encountered many situations where the company provided volume-based, line type discounts to their customers. In some cases the customer decided to place their entire order for a longer period at once to receive the discount, but asked for a staggered delivery over several weeks/month. Entering the deliveries as individual lines will result in the line discount not being received. The user would have to manually enter the discount on each and every line.

The solution is a functionality I often see being forgotten by both users and consultants; the Delivery Scheduler. How does it work?

1. Enter your order line for the full quantity the customer ordered. This will result in any volume-based pricing or discounts (line type) being picked up by the system automatically.

2. Select Sales order line / New / Delivery schedule option after highlighting the line you would like to split into scheduled deliveries.

3. The Delivery schedule form will open up with the original quantity and ship/receive dates.

4. To start scheduling, override the quantity on the first line to be what the first shipment should be. Then click New and enter the scheduled amount and adjust the delivery dates in the new line. Keep doing this until you have scheduled the full quantity.

5. The fields ‘Total quantity’ and ‘Remaining quantity’ will guide you through the creation of the lines to make sure you schedule the whole quantity.

6. When you are done, click OK. The system will keep the original line and create sub-lines for the scheduled deliveries. You will notice how the quantity is now distributed. You can now adjust the delivery dates, etc on the sub-lines.

7. If you are using enhanced delivery date control, all functionalities can be used together with the delivery scheduler.

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