Facilities for Processing Open Items in SAP FICO

To help you process open items efficiently, you can use the following utilities:

Selection and search functions
Prior to processing open items, you can enter specific values to find the items that you want to process. In the line item display, you can search for individual items. Fields are available in which you can enter your search values. You can determine the fields for which the selection and search functions are available. See also Fields for the Selection, Search, and Sort Functions.

Payment advice notes

Payment advice notes in the system contain the following information about incoming payments for clearing open items:

• Gross, net, and remaining amounts for the paid items
• Reason codes and customer reference information for payment differences

Payment advice notes are stored in the system under a key made of the company code, account type, account number, and a payment advice number. Payment advice notes are either entered manually or created automatically (payment advice notes via EDI or electronic bank statement).

When posting and clearing items, you can reference a payment advice note and have the system automatically select and activate the items that match the entries in that payment advice note. The system will also handle any payment differences using the reason codes specified in the payment advice note.

Sort function
In line item display, you can sort the items according to various criteria. To do this, you have to preset the fields that can be sorted so that when you access the sort function. You can choose from a list of fields that can be sorted. See also Standard Sort Sequence.

Line layout of document information
The first screen that appears in all functions of open item processing is an overview screen that displays the most important information about a document. This information can come from the document header and line items and is displayed in one line. You decide which data to display on this line by defining the line layout. You can set up several variants of the line layout. Accounting clerks can store the line layout they use most often under their editing options or in their user master record. Once the clerk executes the function, the system displays the document information based on this variant. When processing open items, the clerk can choose multiple variants and switch back and forth between them. See also Line Layout of Document Information

Default values for cash discount terms and grace days
To process open items, you can also define a default value for the cash discount terms and grace days displayed for the due date calculation of receivables. To define the grace days and the default values for cash discount terms, you make entries in the following fields:

• Grace days for due date determination
• Cash discount terms to be displayed

Work lists
To process open items, you can specify a work list instead of individual account numbers. You use work lists to group together the accounts that you want to include in line item display and open item processing. In their editing options, accounting clerks can specify whether they want to use work lists. For more information, see the Implementation Guide for Financial Accounting.

Block for manual payment
You can use payment block reasons to prevent open items from being processed with the functions for incoming and outgoing payments. To do this, you define the necessary keys for payment block reasons and set them correspondingly. It is still possible to make transfer postings or reverse the items manually.

Internal payment advice notes

If you have to interrupt open item processing, you can save the current state of processing in the form of an internal payment advice note. Later, you can continue processing by referencing the payment advice number.

For more information on the settings you need to make in Customizing, see the Open Item Processing activity in Customizing for Financial Accounting.