Introduction to the Reverse Planning app

Welcome to the Reverse Planning app, the Reverse Planning universe that contains four different functionality, four different major functionality.

Once you have downloaded the Reverse Planning app from AppSource and you have activated the app in the notification ribbon or the assisted setup, you can first of all, when you enter it, you see this picture.

That’s the video you are actually watching now.

You could see this on News Dynamics or in here embedded in Business Central.

And when you click don’t show again, it won’t pop up again.

Otherwise, you can postpone it if you’re not finishing the video right now.

Then you can enter this cockpit in here with the four major functionalities that we have.

The simple MRP planning, move demand dates, identify overstock items and direct replenishment.

And I will just run through those four different functionalities in an overall perspective.

And then you can see in many different videos both the user stories, what they’re meant for, and also the technicality.

How do you go into Business Central in the reverse planning in the different four areas and actually do this stuff? So this is just an overall introduction.

And generally, the simple MRP planning is about doing MRP planning.

It’s about calculating which items to supply and one of the major differences between the planning worksheet and the standard planning worksheet and MRP planning here, the simple MRP, is the fact that we only create new supplies.

So we don’t change quantities, we don’t reschedule, we don’t cancel existing supplies, so we only create lines that are new what-to supplies.’ll get back into that later on.

The move demand dates functionality is about moving supplies when it doesn’t get better.

So with the standard planning, the standard MRP engine, it will calculate backwards saying this is all our supplies and then it will create demands and we will contact vendors or our production to get those supplies in the books.

and then when it doesn’t get better, when the purchaser says we have to talk to the vendors and it doesn’t get better, the standard MRP planning will just suggest to move the supply backward in time, but in real life we need to calculate the other way around.

So we need to create lines of moving demands.

So with this functionality we actually move demand dates, moving sales orders, production orders in time so it’s aligned with the supplies we have.

Identifying overstock inventory is about finding inventory that is potentially too high right now or is going to be too high when supply is coming in.

Because when we have the first two, the simple MRP that only creates new orders, the move demand orders that only reschedule orders, we need to have a tool to find orders that should be cancelled or inventory that is too high.

So, when we don’t have a standard cancelling functionality, maybe we create a sales order, we create a purchase order one-to-one, and the sales supply is being deleted for some reason, we need to find the purchase supply and find out here’s an issue on that one.

But you can also find high inventory values, too much on inventory, you can find items that expire from expiration date or within remaining lifecycle functionality.

And the last one, the direct replenishment, is about doing orders directly, manually.

So you can take and create for a vendor, you can say, give me all the items for that vendor, and you can create items manually in here.

You can also change replenishment system, which is if it’s normally a production item, you can buy it instead or you can transfer it between location that you cannot do with the standard MRP.

Let’s go take a look at some of this.

And the most advanced one is the simple MRP.

That’s the most functionality and what most of our users requires.

And here we can calculate simple MRP and one of the very strong functionalities in here is the ability to work with templates.

So we defined a lot of out-of-the-box templates.

This is like running a planning worksheet with different setup for each of them.

So we can actually run with many different setup.

For instance, on the first one we would find only critical items that goes below zero on end inventory.

That’s a very strong setup in here because in opposite to the normal MRP planning where you can only find item which is actually below safety stock within the period and this one if you look at the template card in here that we created as a default we would say in here trigger on zero and we would say trigger on end inventory this means we don’t care if it goes below zero in the period let’s only look in the period.

Let’s only look in the end of the period we are planning.

If it’s below zero, then it’s interesting.

So this one is looking for the most critical items.

But as you can see in here, there’s quite a lot of setup you can define for each of those templates.

So they are very advanced, the templates.

Behind the scenes, we have made a lot of setup.

By default, you will get them automatically, and the description should say what they’re doing.

So let’s try to run this one.

And I’m using my standard location that I’m planning on here.

So I would expect, and this is actually running 20 times faster than the normal MRP.

So if I ran the normal MRP compared to this one, I would get a lot of lines in here.

We can just try that while I’ll speak about this.

So three items here, my chain assembly, my ModCAD front and ModCAD back.

So actually here, this one, if I look at that one, my item number 1400, if I scroll right see that i have some negative and positive stuff in here but i’m ending up with a negative inventory of minus 10.

so of course this is a important issue my overall net supply is less than my what i need to have so therefore we need to handle this one so this is actually some of my true critical items i also have my chain assembly in here, a chain AC that is critical.

So I need to fix those one on inventory before I do something else.

I can suggest quantity to order in here with a different algorithm in here and carry out actions.

Oops, sorry, set quantity to accept quantity here and carry out action.

And it is moved into a reverse planning worksheet awaiting for me to carry out in here, which is like the normal planning worksheet carry out so this one will actually create orders before doing this i could leave those three lines in here and i could continue calculating let’s say i would also like to find items below safety stock may be triggered on end inventory so now i’m taking into account all items where there’s a safety stock breach on end inventory and we have much more items in here.

I could suggest quantity to order in here with different templates.

Yes, please, and carry out.

So this will fill up in my journal.

And as you can see in my reverse planning worksheet journal in here, this is like my planning worksheet except all the lines are new, only one line per item, and it’s easier for me to overview what to do.

And I could have changed the replenishment system manually and the quantity manually and from here I can carry out those lines let’s take a look at some of the more advanced templates in here just to show you the difference now we looked at two very simple template if we take a template and actually the template in here we just build those template you can build your own template so all the check marks in here you can do stuff in here you can You can transfer orders into your main location.

So I set up this one to transfer or to calculate on all other locations than my main location to do transfer orders into my main location.

And then I want to do production orders on level zero, on level one and level two.

And I can calculate this step by step, or I could calculate it all in one go.

If I show my additional templates, I have it all here automatically.

So all those 10 templates in here is actually calculating from transfer orders first, then production orders on different levels, and then purchase orders in the end.

If I’m taking this one, let me just take it in here, my additional template, the full transfer order thing, planning on this one.

So it will plan first all my external location, only transfer orders, then on my production location, only production orders, then on my production location, only purchase orders.

And for each of them, it will suggest quantity to order, put it in the reverse planning worksheet, and thereby having the depending demand taken into account.

So when I plan on my bike first on the top level, and it figures out you need to transfer so many bikes from production out here to one of my locations out over here, it takes into account all the depending demand on the lower level.

And it’s all moved into my reverse planning worksheet.

So you can see here first all my transfer orders in here.

Transfer orders is of course only a full bike, so there’s no component light on a transfer order.

But then to do that, I need to, on my production location here, to do all those production order.

And if I look at the top level on my item 1000, this one, create 160 pieces to fill in all the transforters above.

And if I look at my components here, I can see all the different parts on the top level that I need to produce to make this possible.

And all those 160 pieces here per item goes into the lower level when I calculated that and so on.

So this is like an iteration that I could calculate per iteration manually or all in one go.

I could also just have set up to calculate all low-level codes in one full go.

I think the last template I would like to show you is also an additional template.

We just hide them to get a little more overview down here.

You can create forecast, demand forecast or sales forecast for production items or purchase items, put it in a sales in an Excel sheet, import it directly into Business Central if you have the flexible forecast app or other way to put it in, then you can use reverse planning to break it all down from your Excel sheet and then to break it down to purchase orders or production order and export that either to Excel or again into flexible forecast.

You can actually use reverse planning to break down a sales forecast into long-term production items or purchase items.

I’m not going to show that right now.

That was the first one, the maybe most advanced one, the most flexible one that does lots of stuff.

The move demand dates action is very simple, basically.

When you go in here, you can still set up in the template.

If you select a template in here, it’s possible to show the template card like we did before and you can see here which sales orders and purchase orders and supplies and demands would you like to include in the calculation but normally you would include most of it for instance in here you could say would you like to include purchase orders or only the release purchase orders and on which date on the purchase order so when we are when we’re figuring out which supplies sorry demands we need to move which demands are we taking into consideration.

So it’s possible to set up here and of course to make many templates.

The whole idea is though that it calculates on my location, my main location here.

You can calculate it and it will calculate upside down starting from low level code, the lowest low level code and then calculate up through the system.

So for instance here my city bike, the bike over here, needs to be moved here from different due dates to other due dates.

And if I look at the graphical profile right now just for this line here, my graphical inventory profile from item number 1000, like this, it seems when I look at it that I should only move this one, the minus 20 here, I’m coming to minus 20 on February 25, and move it over here where I have a positive supply.

But it supply but it calculated up through the full hierarchy so other items for instance this wheel up here is also supposed to be moved from April 10 till May 18 and this causes the other movements further down the lines meaning further up the hierarchy so therefore it calculates up all the way up through the hierarchy some of the lines will I can see the supply changes or the causes to this movement so if I look at my top line here on the item number 1100 and I view the supply changes, I can see here what are the reasons for those changes here for those movements here.

When I change action message like this and I carry out actions, some of the lines which all the firm plan production orders will be moved into my reverse planning worksheet because they will be moved to or be rescheduled.

So where simple MRP only create new lines, this only create rescheduling.

But the two sales line will be moved into what we call a sales handling journal.

Let me just deselect those.

Starting up with the production order lines, carrying out like this.

I will expect those lines to disappear, be entered in the reverse planning worksheet like this, and they will all be of action message reschedule in here because I need to move those whereas if I took the last two lines and I carry out actions on those two it will enter my sales handling journal if I did both at the same time it would ask me if I wanted to open both journals so here this is a journal that we built for reverse planning only and the reason we have a separate journal is because the standard MRP functionality doesn’t work with sales orders.

So we use the standard requisition worksheet, planning worksheet logic to actually carry out the action.

So therefore we want to use as much as standard as possible because it’s rather clever and built to carry out.

But the idea is we only create new lines and rescheduling lines.

Instead of creating change quantity, rescheduling change quantity and all those different lines and canceling lines, we only do those two type of line.

From in here, I can give this to my salespeople and say you have to handle this and if they want to, they could carry out from in here, carry out action that would actually move the sales orders directly in here.

That’s possible.

For this scenario or this example, I would just delete the two lines in here and I would also delete my reverse planning lines so I can explain the last things in here.

So let’s look at the direct replenishment worksheet.

If I’m in the simple MRP and for instance, I’m calculating on, let me take a critical item view and here find critical items on all those different locations here, meaning not my production location, I can take the different lines and I can put them in the reverse planning worksheet.

And so for instance, here in the footer or up here, I have a city bike to location code external, which may be a transfer center or somewhere at a specific location.

I want to carry out on those two, so I will suggest quantity to order.

I will carry out for the location code external with transfer orders, but maybe I want to fill up a full truck.

Let’s carry out this one.

These two lines will…

Oh, sorry.

I just need to…

Not that one.

I need to check mark the right column like this.

So now we have two lines in the reverse planning worksheet, but I want to fill up my truck.

So the problem is I’m sending now from location code production, transfer from, to location code external, and I’m sending this by a car.

So maybe this is my service car, which is going to drive over there.

And I want to fill it up.

This could also have been just a service card that I wanted to fill up.

Now, the problem is I would like to replenish manually on top of this to figure out to utilize volume or cost amount or weights or stuff like that.

Let’s look at the direct replenishment.

Direct replenishment is a tool to create orders totally manually.

So, for instance, if you did create a simple MRP in here, calculate simple MRP for critical items maybe like we did before.

And we are calculating on a location code, which is not our production location code because we want to look at everything else than production, complex filters here like this.

We’re looking for all items that we’re going to transfer out now.

And the issue is we want to utilize weights or volumes or stuff like that in transfer orders or when we send to vendors and so on.

But we need some manual planning functionality or some manual ability to fill up in trucks or service car or even to vendor orders and so on.

So right now we’re just calculating a plan, looking for all different kinds of items in here.

And it pops up here with items that are truly critical, meaning we have a negative in the inventory.

One of them being for my service car.

And my service car is a car that I have a service technician running around doing service of course and he sells items here and there and he’s coming home now to get two of this tube that is lacking.

So the tube here and this is the service car is going to have the tube here in the service car because he needs that one.

So I will carry out the actions which will move this into my reverse planning worksheet.

Issue now is I’m not going to do a pick in the inventory just for this one line.

And then he comes and gets the two tubes and then he leaves again.

So what I will actually do is to take my direct replenishment journal in here and then I can calculate direct replenishment, select the template, for instance, here the direct replenishment transfer to reorder quantity, only transfer orders that I have set up.

So I will only look at items that are transfer orders.

And I like to plan into my service car one.

This means if I have set up SKU cards, stock keeping unit cards for this car exactly with different reorder quantities, I could set up here that it actually suggests automatically what to do.

And the issue is now that I can select item per item here, the one that I would like to handle.

I could change the quantity manually, of course, just like this.

I could look at the quantity of the stock keeping unit card, carry out actions, and it will add this to the reverse planning worksheet.

In here, in the reverse planning worksheet, I can see the total cost, volume, and amount.

Now, we didn’t add volume and weight on this item, on the item card.

Otherwise, it would have been calculated here.

And I could export this to Excel and see the totals of it.

So, it’s a very agile way to figure out what to put in exactly this car.

So that’s the direct replenishment out here.

And the last functionality in the reverse planning is the identify overstock inventory.

In here you can set up different templates.

So you can define your own overstock templates.

For instance, here I’ve defined three templates.

One to look for high value items, item that has a high inventory binding in the value that it’s on, one that find items that expires, meaning I want to find item with remaining shelf life, or maybe I have a template called two times reorder point.

So if I look at the last template here, two times reorder point, I have defined here criteria that I want to look at where the reorder point, and I’m testing if the reorder point against highest inventory is time two.

So if the reorder point times two reaches the highest inventory in the period or the safety stock reach times three reaches the highest inventory then the item should pop up.

So when I calculate it in here find overstock items on my main location I can find items where either the reorder point times two or the safety stock time three is triggered and I can find them down here, see the total value, end inventory, quantities, etc.

to figure out if I need to reduce supplies or if I need to get rid of item when inventory seldom cheaper, especially if they ran for expiration, for expiring.

Let me test the other one, the high value thing here, I could calculate that one,’ve set up look for items with values higher than 20,000, like this.

And again, calculate, it will look for items where the inventory value is higher than 20,000.

So you could say, or you could also say, and items with this high value and so many times safety stock, et cetera, et cetera.

And there’s a lot of criterias in here.

Basically, this is to identify overstock inventory.

So this is a general introduction to the reverse planning.

What it does is a simple way of doing MRP.

It’s a possible way of doing MRP out of the box.

You can install it, you can use it out of the box without doing any setup at all.

There’s many videos here on use dynamics that you can see for all this functionality, both the use cases that we solve, but also how it works deep down in the functionality.