Engineer-to-order projects with their own BOM
For machines built to each customer's design, a confirmed sales order opens a project with the order's steps as tasks. It gets its own bill of materials to edit, and a production order released when the BOM step is done.
PLANSScale only
The problem it solves
- Each custom machine has its own design, but the standard BOM gets edited for every order and is lost.
- Production starts before the customer approves the drawing.
- Design, purchase, production and dispatch of one order are tracked in a spreadsheet.
- The cost of one special order cannot be pulled out of the general production cost.
How it works
- On the item, tick Made to Each Order's Design.
- Confirm a sales order with that item. For each such line, a project is made for the customer with the order steps as tasks. The tasks are Design, Customer Approval, Bill of Materials, Purchase, Production, Inspection, Dispatch.
- The order gets its own bill of materials: a copy of the item's usual one, or an empty one. It is kept out of the usual BOM search and linked to the project. Open it with Order BOM and edit it.
- A draft production order is made on that BOM, linked to the project, so its costs show there.
- Mark the Bill of Materials task done, or press Release to Production on the project: the production order is confirmed. It is refused while the order's BOM has no components.
Everything it does
Order steps
- Seeded: Design, Customer Approval, Bill of Materials (releases production), Purchase, Production, Inspection, Dispatch
- Edit, reorder or add steps under Manufacturing > Configuration > Engineer-to-Order Steps
- Production Starts After It: the step whose task, when done, confirms the production order
- A step with no Entity is used by every Entity
Per sales order line
- Order Project (named after the sales order and the item), Order BOM, Order Production
- The project shows the order line it is for and its production order
- The order BOM carries the sales order number as its reference
Rules
- Only lines with an item made to each order's design start a project
- Release is refused when there is no production order, or the order's BOM has no components
- A production order already confirmed is not confirmed again
Who uses it
SalespersonConfirms the sales order that starts the project.
Design engineer (Planner)Edits the order's BOM and closes the design tasks.
Production ManagerReleases the order to production and follows its cost on the project.
Manufacturing AdministratorSets the order steps and which one releases production.
Where you use it
- Web: the project (Order BOM, Release to Production), its tasks, the sales order line and the production order
- Web: Manufacturing > Configuration > Engineer-to-Order Steps
- Not in the SmartMy Manufacturing app
What you control
Settings
- Made to Each Order's Design: per item, off to start with
- The step that releases production: Bill of Materials to start with
Questions
Does editing the order's BOM change our standard BOM?
No. Each order gets its own copy, kept out of the usual BOM search, so the item's standard bill stays as it was.Can the customer approve the design on a portal?
Not yet. Customer Approval is a task the team marks done; there is no customer approval screen.When does production start?
When the task of the releasing step is done (Bill of Materials to start with), or when someone presses Release to Production on the project.Where do we see the cost of the order?
The production order is linked to the project, so its material and time show on the project's figures.Related features
PRODUCTION AND JOB WORKBills of materials, production orders and work ordersKeep each item's bill of materials with its components and the steps on your machines. A production order reserves the material, lays out the work orders step by step and puts the finished goods into stock at cost.PLANNING, QUALITY AND COSTEngineering changes with approval, BOM versions from a date and where usedA change to an item's components, steps or drawing is raised as an engineering change order. It makes a new version of the bill of materials to edit and goes through approval. It takes over from the date you choose, with the old version kept.PRODUCTION AND JOB WORKEstimates priced by quantity, made into the item, BOM and quotationPrice a new job from its material, its steps on your machines, overhead and margin, at each quantity the buyer asks for. Send the estimate as a PDF; when it is won, the item, its bill of materials and the sales quotation are made from it.PRODUCTION AND JOB WORKSales, purchase and CRM: from lead to goods receivedFollow enquiries through your pipeline, send quotations, take sales orders and invoice them, raise purchase orders and receive the goods into your plant. Every invoice and bill names its plant.PLANNING, QUALITY AND COSTAs-built record of a lotPrint a record of exactly how a lot or serial number was made. It has the order and bill of materials, each component with its lot, and each step with its machine and time. It also has the operators, the rejects and the quality checks with their values.
See your shop floor on it.
Tell us what you make, how many machines and people you run, and how production is recorded today. We will set up a line with you and run a job on the terminal.