Oracle Inventory Module Interview Questions & Answer - Part I

1.       What are different planning methods in Inventory

There are 5 different planning methods in oracle Inventory

·         Subinventory Replenishment Planning

·         Min Max Planning

·         Re-order point planning

·         Kanban Planning

·         Periodic Automatic Replenishment         

2.       What are the setups for Min-Max planning method

·         Define the item in master org and assign the item to the org for which Min-Max planning is used

·         Define the Attribute in Inventory Tab Planning method: Min-Max

·         Min-Max Quantity should have been defined

·         Safety Stock method should be non MRP Planned

·         Determine what should be the status of the Requisitions created for the     planning

·         Define the profile option INV: Minmax Reorder Approval

·         IF ASL has been enabled, then Requisition will populate the supplier data from the ASL setup which is assigned to the item

·         Sourcing rules to be defined

·         Then need to assign sourcing rule to the item

·         In Inventory responsibility, under Planning run the Min Max planning report with required parameter

3.       What is the concurrent program for the planning

·         Min Max planning report under planning menu in Inventory responsibility

4.       What are the setups for expense item?

·         Should not be Inventory Item

·         No Stockable

·         No Transactable

·         No Costing,

·         Not an Inventory Asset

5.       How many key flexfields are there in Inventory?

Seven KFF are there in Inventory

·         Account Alias

·         Item

·         Item Category

·         Item Catalogues

·         Stock Locators

·         Sales Order

·         Service Items

6.       What is the use of sales order KFF?

·         This is used during material transaction when source is Sales Order

·         Segments are Sales order Number, Sales Order Type & Sales Order Source

7.       How we can have the item key flexfield with 2 segments, is it possible, if yes then how, if no then why?

·         This can be modified using Flexfield > Key > Segments

·         Query the System Items, then you can modify the existing structure, or you can add a new one.

8.       How will you inactivate the Inventory locations

·         Define Inactive date in the Location form

9.       What are all the setups done in inventory organization implementation

·         Location

·         Calendar

·         Organization

·         Parameter

·         Cost Group

·         Subinventory

·         Stock Locator

·         Receiving Options

·         Shipping Networks

·         Intercompany Transaction flows

·         Cost Subelements

10.       What are the valuation accounts used in Inventory

·        Material An asset account that tracks material cost. For average costing, this account holds your inventory and intransit values. Once you perform transactions, you cannot change this account.

·        Material Overhead An asset account that tracks material overhead cost.

·        Resource An asset account that tracks resource cost.

·        Overhead An asset account that tracks resource and outside processing overheads.

·        Outside processing An asset account that tracks outside processing cost.

·        Expense The expense account used when tracking a non-asset item

Other Accounts

·        Sales The profit and loss (income statement) account that tracks the default revenue account.

·        Cost of Goods Sold The profit and loss (income statement) account that tracks the default cost of goods sold account.

·        Purchase Price Variance The variance account used to record differences between purchase order price and standard cost. This account is not used with the average cost method.

·        Inventory A/P Accrual The liability account that represents all inventory purchase order receipts not matched in Accounts Payable, such as the uninvoiced receipts account.

·        Invoice Price Variance The variance account used to record differences between purchase order price and invoice price. This account is used by Accounts Payable to record invoice price variance.

·        Encumbrance An expense account used to recognize the reservation of funds when a purchase order is approved.

·        Average Cost Variance Under average costing with negative quantity balances, this account represents the inventory valuation error caused by issuing your inventory before your receipts.

11.       What is ABC Analysis and why it is being used

·        ABC Analysis is an Inventory categorization method to categorize items into 3 different classes A being the most valuable and C being the least valuable ones.

·        Using this Analysis, it will be easy to monitor and keep on track of the valuable items like frequently doing cycle counts on A class items, etc.

12.       What are the process of cycle count

·       Create a cycle count header with required data

·        Assign the items to be counted

         ·        Then run the required cycle count report

·        Using the report do the cycle counts

·        Then go and Approve the cycle count

13.       What is the different in MO Issue and MO Transfer

·        MO Issue will move out the stock from inventory against an account

·        MO transfer will move the stock from one subinventory to other

14.       What is the Picking rule in Inventory

·        Picking Rule is used to determine the list of items for sales order/ shipping based on the revision, Lot, Subinventory and Locator.

·        Assign the required Picking Rule to the item in Order Management tab.

15.       What are the criteria in Cycle count

·        Depending on the requirement, we can trigger cycle count.

·        We can define regular cycle count of high values items.

·        If back ordered or pick denied, we can trigger cycle count for those items. 

16.       What are the diff in Lot and Serial

Lot control is to control a whole batch of items. Example in drug industry we have batch number which can be controlled using lot where we can track the complete batch using specific data.

Serial control is to monitor and track every single quantity of an item like electronic devices where we track by serial number.

17.       What is move order in OM

Move orders generated as part of Pick Wave are the ones from Sales order

18.       How a MO is differ from Subinv transfer

MO generally are the request of movement of items in one organization. It may be of from 3 sources, MO requisition, Replenish MO, Pick Wave MO. MO can be MO Issue which will issue the item from the location and MO transfer which ll transfer the item to another location.

19.       What is nettable in Subinventory setup

This will determine whether to consider the onhands of the subinventory as available for planning tasks.

20.       What are the status attributes in Item and how many of them

We can define different status for an item combination these attributes as per the business need following are the attributes

BOM Enabled

Build in WIP

Customer order enabled

Internal Order enabled

Invoicable

Purchasable

Stockable

Transactable 

21.       What is the use of status attribute

We can define different status for an item combination these attributes as per the business need

22.       Why master org is required

We can have an item maintained at master level with common attributes and then we can use the same item across multiple organization instead of defining it again and again. 

23.       Inventory Master org is mandatory?

Yes. If you will not create any specific master org, then system will consider the same inv org as its master org.

24.       What are the Lot control setups

Lot control can be setup at item attributes at organization level.

As No Control or Full Control

25.       How lot number generates

You can generate new Lot numbers during transactions

26.       What is serial controlled and what are the setups

Serial control can be setup at item attributes at organization level.

27.       How serial numbers are generated

Serial control can be setup at item attributes at organization level.

No Control, At Receipt, At Sales Order issue, Predefined

28.       What is the predefined locator in Subinventory and how it works in business

We can setup locator control in 4 diff ways for each subinventory

None: There will not be any locator information required during any transaction

Prespecified: System will ask you to select locator combinations which already been defined in the subinventory during the transaction

Dynamic Entry: Either you can select any locator during transaction or you can create a new combination

Item Level: This will take the locator which has been defined at item attribute level

29.       What are the transaction managers

Transaction manager is the interface managers which carry out all transaction once submitted by the users

30.       Can we change the item name after it created?

Yes we can change the name in master level.

31.       How WMS is helpful compared to Inventory

Warehouse Management (WMS) enables companies to maximize their utilization of labour, space and equipment investments by coordinating and optimizing resource usage and material flows. Specifically designed to support the needs of distribution, manufacturing, asset-intensive, and service businesses, Oracle WMS provides a single-platform across your entire global supply chain.

32.       What is the use of WMS Rules Workbench

The Rules workbench enables you to assign strategies, rules and cost group values directly to any number of objects in an assignment matrix

33.       Why strategy used

After you define your rules, you must set up a strategy and then associate the applicable rules. After you assign rules to a strategy, the rules engine can execute the strategies on any objects to which the strategy applies. The rules engine executes each subsequent rule in your strategy until an allocation is completely filled.

34.       How many types of bar codes are there

Mainly 2 types Linear (1 dimensional) and Matrix (2D)