Material Master duplication problem

[Former Member]

Dear All,

Kindly provide your valuable advice to find the following.

--how many duplicate material codes exist in the system

--what naming convention can be given so that dupilcation might be avoided (presently system creates material number as internal assignment)

--cleaning materials from the system which are not used for a long time

--same materials with different material numbers which has Price control V and S

Regards

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi

To find the duplicate Materials, go to MARA, MARC or even you will know in MM60.

As you are telling, you have internal no. assignement, you need to control the creation of material ocdes with the descriptions only. You need to follow the specific rule for the material description & as per the policy of the company. How auithorisations have been given to the users to create the material code. You can have a single person authorisation to create all the material codes, so that he can have the trace of the materials created & also he can have the own logic to maintain the description. There would be lot of variations in the creation if u assign to the multiple users. Also, put the deletion flag to the materials permonently to the materials which you do not wish to use( materials either duplicate or Materials with Val. V & S).

Best way is to control the creation with only one user.

Thanks

[former_member763168 · Accepted solution]

Hi

You can find the duplicate materials in by going to se16n

Table are MARA, MARC and for checking material price control you can use table MBEW.

After identifications of material you can block the material for use by using transaction code MM06. This will help you to avoid anyone to use that material.

Now when you recieve request to create new material, then you can unblock the material and change the attributes of material which you require like description, material group or even price in MR21.

You can better fetch the data from system by joining the tables through LFA1.

Where you have same material with different codes just for different price control. It is better that you activate split valuation for that material where in you can use both price control fields for same material.

Regards

Chetandeep

Regards

Chetandeep

[Former Member]

 --how many duplicate material codes exist in the system

As mentioned above most of the solution is already given adding to that apart from the description you can even use "material group","old material number"(if exists) and some other data that is common for all your material and then start searching for the duplicates.

--what naming convention can be given so that dupilcation might be avoided (presently system creates material number as internal assignment

If possible go for external number ranges. This will solve most of your problem. I know it is a very cumbersome activity but always the best as if you follow standard codification then there wont be any possibility for going wrong

--cleaning materials from the system which are not used for a long time

Once you identify or even otherwise you can use MC46 to identify these based on your selection criteria

-same materials with different material numbers which has Price control V and S

Use MR21 for this activity or even MM60 to identify price control

Regards

Ayyallas

[JL23]

How can you know that you have duplicates?

Based on what do you determine that?

often it is just possible to find them by reading its descriptions, and they are often not even equal

one may write Red Balloon and another one Ballon red color

Obviously duplicates, but not easy to find.

We have created own programs that lists potential duplicates based on a fuzzy logic that searches for similar content (not exact matches)

We use this fuzzy logic as well in master data  creation process, where we check for potential duplicates before saving, presenting them to the user and asking if he wants to save or use one of the listed potential duplicates.

if you use classification system, then you can search for materials having the same characteristics, which is often better than using free text searches.

Of course you should flag such duplicates for deletion, but deletion indicators will not stop users from using it, as SAP standard gives only warnings. you either have to change warning messages to errors, all over SAP in verious applications, or you better assign a material status to your material. Material status can be customized to your needs, and you can restricted or just send warnings for certain activities.