Customizing SAP SD: A Guide to Tailoring Sales and Distribution

SAP SD (Sales and Distribution) is a vital module within the SAP ERP suite. It manages essential business processes like sales orders, deliveries, pricing, and billing. While SAP provides:

• A powerful default configuration.
• Customizing the SD module can further align it with your unique business needs.
• Resulting in optimized processes and improved efficiency.

Critical Areas of SAP SD Customization

Let’s explore some of the primary areas where you can tailor your SAP SD module:

1. Organizational Structure:

• • Sales Organizations: Define distinct sales organizations representing separate business units or geographical regions.
  • Distribution Channels: Establish channels (e.g., wholesale, retail, online) to model different ways of reaching your customer base.
  • Divisions: Separate product lines or service types into divisions to better manage materials and reporting.
  • Sales Offices and Sales Groups: Create hierarchical structures within your organization for streamlined sales operations

1. Master Data:

• • Customer Master: Customize fields for important customer information (contact details, pricing terms, shipping preferences).
  • Material Master: Tailor data fields for specific product attributes (industry sector, units of measure, storage requirements).

1. Document Types

• • Sales Document Types: Define various sales orders (standard orders, returns, samples, etc.) with unique rules and controls.
  • Delivery Document Types: Specify different delivery types (standard deliveries, urgent deliveries, pick-ups) with distinct workflows.
  • Billing Document Types: Create billing types (regular invoices, pro-forma invoices) for diverse financial scenarios.

1. Pricing:

• • Pricing Procedures: Develop complex pricing structures considering base prices, discounts, surcharges, taxes, and freight costs.
  • Condition Types: Define various conditions (price, freight, discounts) and create complex logic for their determination.

1. Copy Controls:

• • Control data flow between documents: Determine how data (quantities, pricing, etc.) is copied from sales orders to deliveries or invoices.

1. Partner Determination

• • Automate partner functions: Define which partners (sold-to party, ship-to party, bill-to party) should be automatically included in sales documents based on business roles.

Steps for Customizing SAP SD

Customizing SAP SD typically involves the following steps:

1. Analysis: Thoroughly understand your specific business requirements. Identify areas where the standard SAP SD configuration doesn’t perfectly align.
2. IMG Configuration: Navigate to the SAP Implementation Guide (IMG) and access the SD customization menus (SPRO > SAP Reference IMG > Sales and Distribution).
3. Table Maintenance: Update and maintain configuration tables based on your requirements.
4. Testing: Rigorously test your customizations in a test environment before deployment. Ensure customizations work as intended without disrupting other processes.

Important Considerations

• Leverage Best Practices: Research and adhere to SAP’s recommended best practices for customizations.
• Involve Key Users: Collaborate with business users who understand the operational processes affected by the customizations.
• Documentation: Thoroughly document all your changes for future reference and maintainability.