1. Understand that there are three date types in Cetec for orders: Dock Date, Ship Date, and Work Start Date.
2. Imagine you have end-customer custom make-to-order (MTO) work orders, referred to as the parent orders.
3. Note that parent order line items will have a Dock Date (this is the date the Customer expects to receive shipment).
4. Note that parent order line items will have a Ship Date (this is the day you need to ship it out in order to make good on your Dock Date).
5. Note that parent order line items will have a Work Start Date for the parent assembly, i.e. the finished saleable product (this is the date you need to start work on the final assembly work order in order to make good on your Ship Date). Cetec ERP lets you set up the automation of backing out the Work Start Date from the Ship Date in a number of ways, including setting the production/subcontract lead time on the order, using labor estimates on BOMs filtered through checks and balances, or running it through capacity filters.
6. Imagine that the parent order is for a parent assembly with any number of raw components assembled together with any number of subassemblies, each with their own raw components and production requirements.
7. If you only build the subassemblies to order, Cetec provides the ability to nest and link those as sub work orders underneath the parent order and automatically back out their due dates from the parent order's work start date so the subassembly work orders are complete in time for the work start date of the parent. The sub work order may have its work start date automatically backed out from its due date via blanket auto-set, production lead-time, or finite capacity, and you can also skip sub work orders by assigning the sub as a phantom BOM to flatten components up to the parent level work order.
8. If it is common to overbuild subassemblies, avoid creating discrete sub work orders for every subassembly and instead enter the parent work order so all subassembly procurement requirements propagate to MRP and planning reports for production planning to disposition and schedule via separate batch work orders, which may be entered and scheduled automatically from the MRP report.
9. Once you enter build-for-stock work orders for the subassemblies from the MRP, assign them due dates and backed out work start dates either automatically or manually, and note that the entry and scheduling of these work orders will drive demand for all constituent subassemblies and component requirements for purchasing to review and act upon in planning and MRP purchasing reports.
10. With parent orders driving initial demand, production planning can schedule build-to-stock work orders as far ahead as possible to give Purchasing the best chance to procure needed material in time for production work orders.
11. Note that the paperwork for every one of these work orders, whether parent orders or work orders, will contain the real due date (ship date) on the paperwork and on all digital production orders and production paperwork, and that for end customer orders all three dates are useful, while for build-for-stock work orders the dock date and ship date are set to the same date to represent the production due date.