Simplify Item and BOM Maintenance by Using a Vendor Item Cross Reference
Engineering controls the identification of your internal part numbers but each supplier for that item typically has their own reference. The Vendor Item Cross Reference allows you to associate multiple vendor references to a single inventory item, allowing you to rationalize the Item Master and simplify maintenance of your bills of material.
Consider the example of a ball bearing. It is a standard item that can be purchased from multiple vendors and is considered interchangeable from a Bill of Material perspective. Each vendor’s parts catalog has a different part number for the bearing.
By using the Vendor Item Cross Reference, I can create 1 Inventory item for the bearing. Then create a Vendor Item Cross Reference for each vendor.
With the Item defined, vendors and their references can be maintained via the Vendor Item Master File.
On the Vendor Details Tab, you define each vendor and specifics such as price, unit of measure and restrictions for minimums and order quantity multiples.
You have essentially maintained the items separately but from an internal usage and maintenance of BOMS, there is only 1 item.
Here is where that Vendor Item can be used.
Purchase Order
When creating a Purchase Order for the Vendor, you can look up the item based on your item number or the vendor’s item number.
The Vendor Item Number is also visible on the Receiving Workbench. This is very helpful when the packing slip includes only the vendor’s item information.
