Accounts Receivable > Setup > Product Classes

Product Classes

You use this program to capture and maintain details of product classes required within the system.

Toolbar and menu

Field Description
Global/Branch Select this to maintain product classes for all branches, or a specific branch.

You can only access this field if the branch information is not passed to the program (e.g. you load the program using the Run SYSPRO Program function, or directly from the menu).

When accessed from the Browse on Product Classes program, the system determines the branch from your selection at the By Branch option from the View menu. If selected, it uses the branch entered. If not selected the program assumes you want to configure product classes for all branches.
Global Updates all branches with the product class.

You can only access the Description and Update branches with this product class fields.
Branch Updates the selected branch with the product class details.

You will be unable to access the Update branches with this product class field.
Branch This is the branch for which you want to maintain product classes.
Product class This is the product class you want to maintain for the selected branch.

Product Class Details

Field Description
Customer branch Indicates the Accounts Receivable branch for which the product class is being added or maintained.
Product class

Indicates the code of the product class you are adding or maintaining.

See also: Glossary.
Product class information When adding or maintaining product classes globally, only the Description field and the Update branches with product class option are enabled.
Description Indicates the name associated with the product class. This assists you in verifying that the correct product class has been entered.
Update branches with product class Adds the product class code and description to each Accounts Receivable branch in the system.

This option is only enabled when you are adding or maintaining product classes globally.
Low profit percent Used by the Order Profitability program to highlight orders with a profitability percentage below the amount entered here.
High profit percent Used by the Order Profitability program to highlight orders with a profitability percentage above the amount entered here.
Department This is used by the various Sales Analysis Sales Targets reports as a selection criterion for producing performance and achievement reports.
This year's budgets

The budgets assigned here are used to measure the product class' performance against actual sales, as reflected on the Sales by Product Class report in the Sales Analysis module.

Budgets either represent sales values or sales quantities, depending on your selection at the Budgets represent option (Sales Analysis Setup).
Period 1 - Period 12 Indicate the budget amount/quantity for sales for this product class for each month of your financial year.
Period 13 Indicate the budget amount/quantity for sales against this product class for the thirteenth month of your financial year if you configured 13 accounting periods per year (Company Setup).
Total budgets This indicates the total of the entries made in the This year's budgets section.

Notes and warnings

Prerequisites

  • All product classes must be linked to an Accounts Receivable branch for sales analysis, purchasing and requisition purposes, because product classes are validated against SalProductClasses table.

    This is irrespective of whether the Accounts Receivable module is used. If the Accounts Receivable is not being used, then you need to define a dummy AR branch and assign all product classes to the dummy branch.

Coding considerations

  • The product class is a 20-character alphanumeric field.

    Although you can use special characters (e.g. /, *, +, etc.,) this is not recommended.

    The first two characters can be used to identify the major product category (e.g. BK to indicate bicycles) and the last two characters could be used to identify the primary category (e.g. RB - racing bicycles and MB - mountain bicycles). This would result in the creation of two product classes - BKRB and BKMB. This sort of coding can be reported on using SYSPRO's reporting tools.

    You should not create any new product classes with an underscore (_) as the first character of the product class code. If you do this SYSPRO sees the product class as a non-merchandise product class and this will affect balancing the Sales by Product Class report to the AR Control record.

Deletion considerations

  • You cannot delete a product class if:

    • sales information is held against it for the current year.

      If you delete a product class that only has previous years' information held against it, then this information is lost.

  • If the product class you want to delete exists in more than one branch, then you can choose whether to delete the product class only for the current branch or throughout the system.

Maintenance considerations

  • You should not change product class codes once you have started using them, as this may result in the loss of valuable sales information.

Database considerations

The following product class files/tables are maintained by the system:

File/Table Description
SALPDS/SalProductClassDes

This contains only the product class code and its description, enabling you to browse on product classes from various programs without first entering a branch code.

The product class descriptions are also retrieved from this file/table for the Inventory Valuation and Inventory Query programs.
SALPRD/SalProductClass This contains additional information including the link to an Accounts Receivable branch and budget information for each product class and is used to integrate sales to the General Ledger.

Inserting Application Help

You would typically follow this procedure to display help for the current program in a customized pane that can be pinned to the program window.

Information includes step-by-step instructions for the various functions available within the program, including a brief overview of what the program does, what setup options are required and how to personalize the program.

  1. Open the program for which you want to insert application help into a customized pane.

    This functionality is only available for a program that has panes.

  2. Right-click any form field.

    You can also click the triangle menu icon that appears in the title area of a pane.

  3. Select Insert Application Help from the context-sensitive menu.

    The application help appears in a pane within your program. You can reposition the pane using the docking stickers or pin it to the program window.

Removing the Application Help pane

If you no longer want to display application help in a pane for your current program, you can simply remove it.

  1. Select the Close icon in the right-hand corner of the application help pane.

  2. Confirm that you want to delete the pane.