SAP ERP system is based on “document principle”. Every business transaction posted in an SAP system creates and stores document number. When you post an invoice or payment, document number is created. When you post reverssal of the invoice or payment, another document number is created. The document provide an audit trail for all transactions entered into the system. You can have a complete record of all transactions executed and posted in the system.The SAP system enables you also to drilldown from the display balance to the original transactions. For example, you’re displaying the customer balance. You can trace the original transaction through the document environment. You can display the original document where a specific transaction originated.When you post transaction in Financial Accounting, it creates various documents, depend on the components involve. Individual document is created for Financial Accounting,  Profit Center Accounting, Profitability Analaysis, and Cost Center Accounting. Do remember that the components of SAP ERP system are integrated. You don’t need to update individually each component.There are two main parts of a SAP document:1. HEADERThe header part contains information such as the posting date, document date, company code, currency, reference, document header text, and document number. The header part applies and valid to all line items in a document.2. LINE ITEMSA journal entry compose of line item entry, debit and credit. Each journal entry should have a debit and a credit and the balance should always equal. The line items contain information like the posting key, account, amount, assignment, text, and account assignment fields. Each line item are independent from the others.Furthermore, you can also control what specific fields can still be changed to a posted document. However, in SAP standard, there are fields which are set to be permanently non-modifiable for control purposes e.g. amount, document number, posting date, document date, currency, company code and CO assignment field.

Sap ac payable:

he Accounts Payable application component of SAP system handles and manages financial transactions and accounting data of all vendors. It is fully integrated with Material Management component through account determination. Vendors are treated in the system as subsidiary accounts. Logically, monitoring should be done at vendor level. Transactions to each vendor is unique, hence necessitate individual recording and monitoring.Each vendor account is link with a general ledger account. The general ledgeraccount must be a reconciliation account for account type K (vendor). This allows all postings to vendor transfer simultaneously and seamless to the Accounts Payable g/l account. Good thing is, the subsidiary accounts and the reconciliation g/l accounts are always balanced; hence, no reconciliation activity needed to tally the balance.Vendor Master

The vendor master pertains to information about the vendor which remain unchanged over an extended period of time. It controls how transactions and data are processed by the system for the company. Do remember that each vendor must have a master data created in the system. Otherwise, you can not do business with the vendor in the system.

Vendor Account Group Just like the G/L account group, the purpose of the vendor account group is to manage and

organize huge numbers of vendor accounts in the system; Normally, vendors with the same business functions are assigned to one account group;

The number range for vendor master is determined also by the account group;

The account group also determines the fields (required, optional, diaplay, or suppress fields) for the entry screen when creating or changing vendor master.

Vendor Master DataVendor master data is grouped into three parts:General Data

This gives basic information about a vendor such as vendor name, address, TIN, payment transactions information, contact persons and communication. General data applies to all company codes using the vendor. For example, change in vendor name.

Company Code Data This gives information specific to individual company code. Example of information under this

area are reconciliation accounts, sort key, terms of payment, payment method, and correspondence. Any change on company code-specific data won’t affect other company codes.

Purchasing Organization Area Data Information on this area is relevant and applies to the purchasing organizations of the company.

Example of information under this area are order processing, billing, shipping info and terms of payment.

To create vendor master, you can use transaction code FK01 or XK01. The difference of the two is that, if you use FK01 the Purchasing Organization Area Data screen won’t appear. So you can create only vendor information on the general and company code data. Whereas, if you use XK01 all the above 3 areas appears and you need to fill up the required and necessary information.Business Transaction Processing

Basically, transactions involving vendors are downpayment, invoice postings, downpayment clearing/application, debit memo, and outgoing payment. Each of the said transaction types use different document types e.g. vendor invoice is KR, incoming payment is KZ. Each transaction posted in the system creates a unique document number.

If the business processes in the company require approvals and authorization , then the document parking functionality can be used. The encoder can park the data of the invoice. The approver do the final posting of the transaction. During document parking, the balances of the accounts are not updated.

Vendor account can be monitored easily. Outstanding (open items) are segragated from those already collected (cleared items).

The SAP system provides dynamic reporting for vendor accounts in the system which greatly help the collection and accounting department manage data of vendors.

Reporting

SAP delivers readily available to use reporting in Accounts Payable application component. Example; diplay vendor account balance, display line items, vendor aging report, due date analysis, and etc.

Drilldown reporting is standard in SAP system. There is an online trail of information from the current document to the original source document(s). 

The Financial Accounting application component of SAP satisfies the requirement of the accounting department of your organization. Each Company is required to provide and submit financial statements to the government who has jurisdiction over the company’s operation. The financial statements is a result of all financial transactions recorded by the company. The Financial Accounting component of SAP greatly helps the accounting department of your company to generate reliable, relevant and accurate financial information.

Components of SAP Financial Accounting ModuleGeneral Ledger

This serves as complete records of all business transactions; This gives users free choice of level of financial reporting;

Reconciliation G/L account with subsidiary accounts are simultaneously and updated;

General ledger and cost accounting areas are simultaneously updated; and

There is a real-time evaluation of and reporting on current accounting data.

Accounts Receivable This submodule records and manages all accounting data and transactions for customers; Postings to customers (subsidiary account) are simultaneously posted to Accounts Receivable g/l

accounts. No month-end reconciliation is needed;

There is an online open item (outstanding balance) processing;

Individual customer accounts can be monitored online;

Dunning procedures is available;

Seamless integration with the Treasury; and

It supports credit management for customers and liquidity planning for cash management.

Accounts Payable This records and manages accounting data for all vendors; Postings to vendors (subsidiary account) are simultaneously posted to Accounts Payable g/l

accounts. No month-end reconciliation is needed;

There is a seamless integration of Accounting with Purchasing (MM) through Invoice Verification (could be the 2 way or the 3 way match);

There is a management of One-time accounts (one-time vendors);

There is an online processing of payment proposals;

It supports liquidity planning for Cash Management; and

There is a downpayment processing (via FI direct postings or with reference to PO).

Bank Accounting This submodule manages accounting transactions processed with banks; Posting to bank subsidiary accounts are posted directly and simultaneously;

Supports posting of cash flows such as incoming and outgoing payments;

There is the functionality of Bill of exchange (Post-dated checks); and

There is a cash journal (Petty cash fund). 

 Asset Accounting This module records and handles fixed assets (Property, plant and equipment); Postings to fixed asset subsidiary are simultaneously posted to Asset g/l accounts;

There is an integration with the Purchasing (MM);

There is an online calculation and posting of depreciation. Depreciationpostings are transferred automatically to Controlling component; and

Leased assets and asset under construction (AUC) are handled.

Travel Management This handles the request, the planning and the booking of trips, also the settlement of travel

expenses and the transfer of settlement results ot other business functions ares; and IT has 3 sub-components: Travel request, Travel planning, and Travel expenses.

The Controlling (CO) component of SAP R/3 system contains all accounting functions necessary for effective controlling for businesses. Every organization normally have an external and internal  accounting viewpoints. The external viewpoints is represented by Financial Accounting (FI) component and Controlling (CO) represents the internal accounting viewpoint. CO component of SAP system offers a broad selection of functional tools that can be used to provide managementaccounting information that are useful for management decision making. Do remember that Financial Accounting and Controlling are independent components of the SAP system. The data flow from the CO component to FI component takes on a regular basis.Components of Controlling (CO)A. Overhead Cost Controlling (CO-OM)Cost and Revenue Element Accounting (CO-OM-CEL)

This provides the structure for assignment of CO data through the classification of transaction items in accordance with the nature of the cost or revenue posted to a CO object such as cost center, internal order, and etc.

This component is resposible for the structure of accounts where costs and revenues of an organization are automatically updated the CO objects.

Cost Center Accounting (CO-OM-CCA)

Cost Center Accounting provides information where costs occur in an organization. It tracks the sources of costs from the different organization of the company.

The design of cost center for each organization varies. However, the typical approach is to define a cost center for each low-level group or organizational unit that is responsible for managing costs. 

Internal Orders (CO-OM-OPA) Internal Orders in SAP system is normally a tool for planning, collecting, and settling the costs of

internal jobs and tasks. This is a highly flexible CO tool that can be used for a wide variety of purposes to track costs and sometimes revenues within a specific controlling area.

Activity-Based Costing (CO-OM-ABC) Activity-Based Costing application component of SAP system is helpful in

allocating overhead costs to products and to other cost objects using the resource drivers. ABC allocation is more relevant and reliable compared with the traditional overhead allocation. In ABC approach, the resources consumed by the different business processes are assigned to the respective origin of costs.

B. Product Cost Controlling (CO-PC)Product Cost Planning (CO-PC-PCP)

This area of Product Cost Controlling can use by companies to plan costs of materials without reference to any orders. It can be used also to set material prices and other cost object prices. Further more this can be used to plan and analyze the product costs e.g. material cost, service cost, and other add-on intagible costs.

PCP can be used to calculate the Cost of Goods Manufactured (COGM) and Cost of Goods Sold (COGS). COGM composes all the costs incurred to produce a product which includes material costs, direct labor and overhead costs. COGS is the sum of COGM and any direct costs incurred in selling the product to a customer.

It is very important to monitor efficiently and effectively the costs incurred to your producs. With SAP Product Cost Planning, the above goal can be achieved.

Cost Object Controlling This area of Product Cost Controlling can be used to determine efficiently and effectively what are

the costs incurred for each object. This area is subdivided into; Product Cost by Order, Product Cost by Period, Product Cost by

Sales Order, Cost for Intangible Goods and Services.

One of the basic common decision management normally dealt with is “Should we buy the materials or should we produce?“. Normally, if everything is equal management will choose the decision that entails lesser costs.

Actual Costing/Material Ledger (CO-PC-ACT) This component application accomplishes these basic objectives; Carry material prices in multiple

currencies/valuations, and actual costing. Normally, the values of material inventory (raw materials, semi-finished goods, finished goods)

are reflected in the system in one currency which is the company code currency. With the

material ledger there can be additional twocurrencies to manage the values of the materials in the system.

Product Cost Controlling Information System (CO-PC-IS) This application component renders useful and extensive range of reports for Product Cost

Planning, Cost Object Controlling, and Actual Costing/Material Ledger.

C. Profitablity ManagementProfit Center Accounting (EC-PCA)

A profit center is a management-oriented organizational unit used for internal controlling. For instance, you may treat each of your product group as profit center in the system. This

enables you to monitor the revenues and costs attributable to each product group. You can do an evaluation on each profit center; profit and loss and balance sheet.

Profitability Analysis (CO-PA) The profits and contribution margins for market segment of a company can be analyed using

Profitability Analysis application component of SAP. The objective of COPA is to support sales, product management, and corporate wide planning

and decision making, using an external view from a market oriented perspective.

General Ledger Accounting is essentially functions as a complete record for all financial business transactions. All business transactions that have financial impact are posted to the appropriate general ledger account. On my opinion, SAP is the best ERP business software in the world. All components are fully integrated. The general ledger accounting of the system receives automatically all financialtransactions from other component i.e. SD, MM, PS through account determination. General Ledger Master Data

G/L master data pertains to information on G/L accounts which remain unchanged over an extended period of time;

Master Data vs Transaction Data - The former refers to information which remain unchanged over an extended period of time. Master data controls how data are entered and processed. Whereas, transaction are linked and managed using master data.

Chart of Accounts  Chart of accounts contains the definitions of general ledger accounts. The definitions consist

primarily of the account number, account name, and the G/L account type (BS account or P&L account);

Do remember that each G/L account is set-up according to a chart of accounts;

Assignment rule, only one chart of accounts can be assigned to a company code. Multiple company code can use the same chart of account.

General Ledger Master data SegmentChart of account Segment

The chart of accounts contains basic information for each of the g/l accounts. The chart of account segment contains g/l account information such as: account number, account name (short text & long text), control fields (whether BS or P&L account), and consolidation fields.

Company Code Segment

Assignment rule: multiple company codes can use one chart of accounts. Before a company code can use the g/l account the Company Code Segment has to be created. The company code segment information is specific to each company code. Any changes on any of the information on this segment won’t affect the g/l account information on other company codes who are using the same chart of accounts. Information on this segment is unique for each company code.

General Ledger Account Fields Chart of Account Segment fields: Name, Control and Consolidation Company Code Segment fields: Account Control, Account Management, Document Entry,

Bank/Financial Details, Interest Calculation and Joint Venture

Account Group Account group is use to manage and organize large number of general ledgeraccounts. Normally,

general ledger accounts with similar business functions are assign in the same account group. Example of account groups are: cash accounts, reconciliation accounts,asset accounts, material

accounts, revenue accounts and expenses accounts.

Control can be set-up for each account group so that g/l accounts are not misplaced to other groups. To do that, number range should be assigned to each account group in the configuration.

Reconciliation Accounts Reconciliation accounts are general ledger accounts that have subsidiary

accounts. Transactions can not be posted directly to reconciliation accounts. All transaction postings must be done through subsidiary accounts and the assigned reconciliation accounts are updated online and seamless. There’s no need to do a month-end reconciliation to tally the balance of reconciliation accounts and its subsidiary accounts.

Example of account types that should be set-up as subsidiary in the system are Customer accounts receivable (D), Vendors accounts payable (K) and Fixed assets (A).

Bear in mind that all business financial transactions that are not handled byAccounts Receivable, Accounts Payable, and Fixed Asset sub-components of Financial Accounting are posted through general ledger accounting. In short,transactions that are posted through general ledger accounting are those not affecting subsidiary accounts. Example of transactions are month-end and year-end adjustments, customer doubtful accounts, provision for inventory obsolescense, provision for income taxes, and others.

The Accounts Receivable application component of SAP system handles and manages financial transactions and accounting data of all customers. It is fully integrated with Sales and Distribution component through account determination. Customers are treated in the system as subsidiary accounts. Logically, monitoring should be done at customer level. Transactions to each customer is unique, hence necessitate individual recording and monitoring.Each customer account is link with a general ledger account. The general ledger account must be a reconciliation account for account type D (customer). This allows all postings to customer transfer simultaneously and seamless to the Accounts Receivable g/l account. Good thing is, the subsidiary accounts and the reconciliationg/l accounts are always balanced; hence, no reconciliation activity needed to tally the balance.Customer Master

The customer master pertains to information about the customer which remain unchanged over an extended period of time. It controls howtransactions and data are processed by the system for the company. Do remember that each customer must have a master data created in the system. Otherwise, you can not do business with the customer in the system.

Customer Account Group Just like the G/L account group, the purpose of the customer account group is to manage and

organize huge numbers of customer accounts in the system; Normally, customers with the same business functions are assigned to one account group;

The number range for customer master is determined also by the account group;

The account group also determines the fields (required, optional, diaplay, or suppress fields) for the entry screen when creating or changing customer master.

Customer Master DataCustomer master data is grouped into three parts:General Data

This gives basic information about a customer such as customer name, address, TIN, payment transactions information, contact persons and communication. General data applies to all company codes using the customer. For example, change in customer name.

Company Code Data This gives information specific to individual company code. Example of information under this

area are reconciliation accounts, sort key, terms of payment, payment method, and correspondence. Any change on company code-specific data won’t affect other company codes.

Sales Area Data Information on this area is relevant and applies to the sales organizations and distribution

channels of the company. Example of information under this area are order processing, billing, shipping info and terms of payment.

To create customer master, you can use transaction code FD01 or XD01. The difference of the two is that, if you use FD01 the Sales Area Data screen won’t appear. So you can create only customer information on the general and company code data. Whereas, if you use XD01 all the above 3 areas appears and you need to fill up the required and necessary information.Business Transaction Processing

Basically, transactions involving customers are downpayment, invoice postings, downpayment clearing/application, credit memo, dunning and incoming payment. Each of the said transaction types use different document types e.g. customer invoice is DR, incoming payment is DZ. Each transaction posted in the system creates a unique document number.

If the business processes in the company require approvals and authorization , then the document parking functionality can be used. The encoder can park the data of the invoice. The approver do the final posting of the transaction. During document parking, the balances of the accounts are not updated.

Customer account can be monitored easily. Outstanding (open items) are segragated from those already collected (cleared items).

The SAP system provides dynamic reporting for customer accounts in the system which greatly help the collection and accounting department manage data of customers.

Reporting SAP delivers readily available to use reporting in Accounts Receivableapplication component.

Example; diplay customer account balance, display line items, customer aging report, due date analysis, and etc.

Drilldown reporting is standard in SAP system. There is an online trail of information from the current document to the original source document(s).  

In accounting terms,  credit memo and debit memo terminologies are usually used. If you’re not acquainted with accounting terms, you might not fully understand what these terms mean and their uses. The objective of this article is to explain clearly the meaning and uses of both terms.Credit memo and debit memo are related to accounts receivable and accounts payable, respectively. When a company sells to a customer, normally it’s sales on credit. Basically, sales on credit attracts more buyers to buy goods and services, compared to cash sales. The sales on credit transactions should be recorded in the books of the company as accounts receivable which may be due in certain days from the date of sale depends on the terms granted to the customer.On the other hand, if a company is the buyer it prefers to purchase on account (credit). The money could be used for more liquid activities rather than instantly paying the supplier. For purchases on account, accounts payable to supplier should be recorded in the books. The liability may be due in certain days depends on the credit term granted by the supplier.Credit memo is a transaction where an accounts receivable from a customer is reduce. Upon receipt of notification that certain goods are damage and with poor quality, you prepare a credit memo. A credit memo is a document indicating that you’re crediting (reducing) the account of the customer.  E.g. the sales price is 100 and the allocated value of damage goods is 10, the remaining receivable is only 90. Hence, the effect of credit memo is to reduce the balance of accounts receivable.A debit memo is a note informing the suppliers that a certains goods purchased are damaged or not in accordance with the prescribed quality agreed. The effect of a debit note is to decrease the amount of payable to suppliers. You prepare a debit memo to inform your supplier that you’re debiting (reducing) your liability.An accounting software should have the functionality to handle credit and debit memo transactions. SAP system handles the two transactions smoothly and perfectly.The Fixed Asset Accounting component of SAP system handles transactions and data for company’s fixed assets. Just like the AR (customers) and AP (vendor) component, each fixed asset is treated in the system as subsidiary ledger. Each fixed assset has a complete record in the system, from acquistion to retirement. This component has seamless integration with the other SAP components such as Financial Accounting (FI), Controlling (CO), Material Management (MM) and Production Planning (PP).Chart of Depreciation

Chart of depreciation is country specific, and SAP provides already model chart of depreciation for most countries. The main purpose of this is to manage the respective legal requirements of asset valuation and depreciationfor companies;

Each company code in the system should be assigned to Chart ofDepreciation;

Only one chart of depreciation can be assigned to a company code;

More than 2 company codes can use one Chart of Depreciation.

Asset Class Asset Class is maintainted at client level. This means that the asset class in an SAP system is

valid and applicable to all company codes in the client; Asset class serves as fixed asset classification according to legal and management requirements;

Considered as the most important way of structuring fixed assets in SAP system.

Depreciation Area Depreciation area is use to calculate different values in parallel for each individual asset. For

instance, there are different types of values for the balance sheet, and for cost accounting or for tax purposes;

Depreciation areas are group together in accordance with the requirements of a specific country or economic area, into a chart of depreciation.

Account Determination All transactions for each individual asset e.g. changes of asset values are automatically updated

the general ledger accounts for fixed assets through Account Determination; Depreciation are automatically computed by the system, the computed values are automatically

posted to the depreciation g/l accounts.

Asset Master Record Contains the records of assets that remain unchange over an extended period of time; This provides long-term documentation of the fixed assets;

Grouped into eight categories such as; General, Time-dependent, Allocations, Origin, Net Worth Tax, Insurance, Leasing, Depreciation Areas.

Asset Transactions Aquisitions - Purchase from vendor, or Purchase from affiliated companies (Inter-company

transactions), or In-house production. Transfers - Transfer within the company (intra-transfer) or Transfer between company codes

(Inter-company transfer);

Depreciation - Planned depreciation, or Unplanned depreciation;

Retirement - Retirement by Sale, or Retirement by Scrapping.

This article is really helpful to all Beginners and to other Advance SAP Users and Consultants. Share these basic knowledge on Navigating the SAP system to others through referring this post.A. Logging On to SAP R/3 SystemThe SAP R/3 system is a client system. Each user session has only access to data in the client specified by the user when logging on. Before a username can be used to access the SAP system, it must be created using transaction SU01 and stored in the user master record.B. PasswordDuring logging on, you’re required to enter password that match with the password of the username entered as maintained in the user master record. The password is a combination of alpha-numeric

characters. Password is very effective security and prevents other users from accessing or modifying (messing up) your work. The system does not display the password you enter during logging on.Here are some points to remember about the Password:

It can compose up to 8 characters No three (3) characters in a row the same

C. Logging Of from SAP R/3 SystemLogging off from the system is the exact opposite of logging on. To log off, you may select the X button on the upper right hand of the screen just like your MS Office applications and other systems. Or you may use transaction codes as short cuts. If you want to exit immediately, use transaction code /NEX. If you want the “Log off” pop-up window confirmation to appear then use transaction code /NED.D. SAP Easy AccessThe SAP Easy Access is the initial screen in SAP system. Others sometime called the entry point of SAP system. It can be personalized to contain only those items a user frequently access on his daily tasks. It has also favorite folder to keep frequently access transaction codes.E. SAP WindowThe SAP window is the user interface to the SAP system. It composes these parts:

Menu bar Standard tool bar

Title bar

Application tool bar

Status bar

Screens (screen header and screen body)

Input field  

F. SAP MessagesThere are different types of SAP messages and those can be categorized by the first character in the message code:

E or F - These indicate an error message. A user can not proceed with the next processing unless the error is corrected. The cursor usually highlights the field where the error occured.

W - indicates a warning message. It could indicate also that a possible error has occured and the system wants the user to check an entry before proceeding. If this message appears during processing, you can still continue with processing the transaction by pressing Enter on your keyboard.

I - This indicates an information message. This will assist the user that a specific event in the system has taken place. For instance, posting accounts receivable after selecting the Save button the document number created displayed on the bottom of the screen. 

G. TabsThis enables user(s) to enter, display, and jump between multiple screens. Fortransactions containing multiple screens, tabs really provide clearer overview. Furthermore, tabs enable user(s) to proceed from one tab page to the next without having completed all the data, unless required field(s). To jump to other tab, just select the corresponding tab header.  

H. Radio buttons and Check boxesRadio buttons and Checkboxes are sometimes serve as additional criteria or filter to enter transactions and display reports in an SAP system. There are instances that these are both present in teh selection.I. Dialog BoxesThe system usually displays dialog box for these cases:

When the system requires more information before proceeding to the next processing When it provides information such as messages or specific information on your current system

tasks

Normally, you must choose an action (e.g. Yes or No) from the dialog box before you can proceed with the next processing. Example, when you log-off with the system, a dialog box pop-up to confirm whether you want log off with or without saving your data.