Work Order Status

The status of a work order determines how much control you have over its bill, routing, inventory allocations, inventory transactions, and labor feedback:

• You cannot make any changes to orders with status Planned. These are managed by MRP.

• For orders with status Firm Planned, you can change the dates and quantities as needed, and specify an approved alternate bill or routing.

• For orders with status Exploded, Allocated, or Released, bills and routings can be modified or alternate ones specified.

A work order progresses from one status code to the next and, unless prematurely released, does not return to an earlier status.


Type Code	Description	Life Cycle
Blank	Standard	Planned—Firm Planned—Exploded—Allocated—Released—Closed
F	Final Assembly	Exploded—Allocated—Released—Closed
R	Rework	Allocated—Released—Closed
E	Expense	Released—Closed
S	Scheduled	Exploded—Closed
C	Cumulative	Released—Closed
W	Flow	Exploded—Deleted (system action)

After entering an order, change its status to Firm Planned, Exploded, or Allocated using Multiple Work Order Status Change (16.8). Effect of Status Change on Bill and Routing shows how the status changes affect a work order’s BOM and routing.


	Planned	Firm Planned	Exploded	Allocated	Released	Closed
Bills	Bill created		Components frozen	Inventory allocated	Inventory picked
Routings		Routing created and scheduled	Routing operations frozen

Planned orders are generated by MRP and are replanned as requirements change. You cannot record inventory transactions or labor feedback against them, or change quantities, dates, bills of material, or routings.

Approving a planned work order with Planned Work Order Approval (23.10) changes its status to firm planned.

See Material Requirements Planning for more information about planned orders.

Note: Work orders with statuses other than Planned have fixed quantities and due dates and are therefore not replanned by MRP.

A firm planned order has been approved. This is the default status for an order you create in Work Order Maintenance. MRP does not replan these orders, but instead, generates action messages as needed.

A firm planned order has a work order bill and a routing with scheduled operations. These are not fixed. Bills are re-exploded by MRP, while routings are re-exploded by CRP. Both are re-exploded when the status is changed to Exploded, Allocated, or Released. This allows entry of a work order for a fixed quantity and date, while reflecting future engineering changes in the bill or routing as the order advances toward release.

You cannot record inventory transactions or labor feedback against firm planned orders.

A batch status indicates that this is a firm planned order entered in batch. This method speeds up processing for large numbers of orders. The system does not create and explode bills or routings for these orders until their status changes. As a result, MRP does not recognize any component demand.

Enter batch work orders manually as needed, or create them automatically for routable components when changing the order status to Allocated or Released. Use Multiple WO Status Change (16.8) to change order status at the appropriate time.

You cannot record inventory transactions or labor feedback against a batch order.

Exploding a work order recalculates the work order bill and freezes the bill along with the routing. The bill and routing can only be changed manually—until the order is released.

Note: When the explosion takes place, any requirements for phantom items are not exploded into requirements for their lower-level components.

You cannot record inventory transactions or labor feedback against work orders with status Exploded.

Allocated orders are extensions of exploded orders and are used for inventory transactions. You cannot record labor feedback against orders with status Allocated. Allocated orders differ from exploded orders in the following ways:

• When the work order bill is created, the system explodes through the requirements for phantoms if needed, using up quantities of phantom items already in inventory before creating requirements for their components.

• Work orders are automatically created for components with Pur/Mfg codes set to Routable in Item Planning Maintenance (1.4.7). These orders normally have a status of Batch.

A released order is like an allocated order except that detail allocations are made for its components and its operations are scheduled. Depending on which program is used, a picklist or routing can be printed when an order is released. The picklist uses detail allocations to indicate the specific inventory detail records to pick for the order.

You can record inventory transactions or labor feedback against work orders with status Released.

Work orders are typically closed when the items are received. This status is useful for reporting. For most purposes, this ends the life cycle. You cannot process inventory transactions for closed orders. However, additional labor can be reported until either: