You have the opportunity to see where an item-tracked item was used, including how and when it was received or produced, transferred, sold, consumed, or returned. You can also trace where specific serial or lot numbers were used. The two features that allow you to do this are Navigate and Item Tracing.
These features can be particularly useful in quality control when you need to find out which customers received products with a particular lot number or when you need to find out which lot a defective component came from.
When working with lot and serial numbers, you have the option of using the Item Tracking tab in the Navigate window. On this tab, you define the lot or serial numbers that you want to trace and you can then see which entries and documents the particular number was used for. This feature searches for all entries and documents containing the number across all items.
The Item Tracing window can show you all the posted documents where a particular item, variant, serial, or lot number was used. In this window, you can choose to see components and you can see how different documents relate to one another.
To use item tracing, do the following:
Open the Item Tracing window.
In the filter fields at the top of the window, enter the specific item numbers or a filter on the item numbers that you would like to trace.
In the Show Components field, select whether you would like to also see where the components for the items came from. Your options in this field are:
No: Select this option if you do not want to see any components.
Item-tracked Only: Select this option if you want to see only components that have lot or serial numbers.
All: Select this option if you want to see all components.
In the Trace Method field, select the method you would like to use for tracing the item in the program. The options are:
Usage->Origin: This method traces the item starting from where it was used in the program to where it came from. For instance, if a manufactured item was sold to a customer, the Item Tracing window shows this with the sales shipment line first, which you can then expand to see from which production order it came.
Origin->Usage: This method traces the item starting from where it came into inventory to where it was used. For instance, if a manufactured item was sold to a customer, the Item Tracing window shows this with the finished production order first, which you can then expand to see sale shipment lines where the item was used.
Click Trace to run the trace.
In this window, you can also use the back and forward buttons to quickly see the results of previous traces and to return to the later traces.
If you have received the same lot on more than one order or journal, whether it is a receipt, a transfer order, or an output, the item tracing feature only shows one of the orders in the headline when you run a trace on the lot number.