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SAP Sales and Distribution (SD) Interview Questions
SAP SD(Sales and Distribution) is one of key component of SAP ERP system and is used to manage shipping, billing, selling and transportation of products and services in an organization.
 
SAP Sales and Distribution module is part of SAP Logistics module that manages customer relationship starting from raising a quotation to sales order and billing of the product or service. This module is closely integrated with other modules like SAP Material Management and PP.
SAP Sales and Distributions Primary Functions are :

* Inquiries & Quotes
* Sales Orders
* Sales Return
* Consignment
* Contract & Scheduling Agreements
* Credit & Debit Memo requests
* Rush Orders & Cash Sales
* Back Orders
As with all the modules in SAP ECC, everything in SAP SD revolves around master data stored and manipulated in centralized master data tables.

There are two other data types in ECC :
* Transactional data
* Customizing data.

Master data types in SD include customer data, pricing and materials. The master data is used to create transactional data in SAP ECC, such as a sales order in SD, maintenance record in PM, purchase order in MM or production order in PP.

Customizing data is generated when an organization customizes SD to meet its particular requirements.
SAP SD consists of several sub-modules that can be configured to handle specific functions in the module :
 
* SD Master Data (SD-MD) tracks each transaction that affects the SD module's data, including customer data, materials data, price condition records, and credit management.

* SD Basic Functions (SD-BF) allows you to establish the basic functions that work across SD, such as pricing, goods availability check and credit management.

* SD Sales (SD-SLS) handles the details of the sales process, such as customer data, products, pricing and feedback.

* SD Shipping (SD-SHP) tracks the details of the shipping process, including when and how the order is shipped through to delivery or return.

* SD Transportation (SD-TBA) works closely with SD-SHP and keeps track of all the transportation data involved in the shipment.

* SD Foreign Trade (SD-FTT) handles the details related to foreign trade transactions, including both exports and imports.

* SD Billing (SD-BIL) manages billing data, including the amounts of the transactions and methods of payment.

* SD Sales Support (SD-CAS) handles the data generated in the interactions between customers and sales teams.
The organizational structure in sales and distribution is.
 
* Sales Organization
* Distribution Channel
* Division
* Sales Office
* Sales Group
SAP was initially developed by a few IBM employees to resolve the problems arising in a software application. After some time, SAP came up with application software, i.e., SAP R/3 where R means real-time data processing and 3 represents Application, Presentation, and database leaders
 
Eventually, it gained popularity among many huge enterprises which resulted in adding so many other SAP modules to cover certain areas in a business. A few of those modules are Finance and accounting, controlling, production and planning, materials management, etc.
There are many components in SAP sales and distribution like sales areas, distribution channel, divisions, sales office, sales group. And it follows two main steps which go as follows : 
 
* To create organization elements in the SAP system

* And to link each element according to the requirement.
Distribution channel tells the medium by which products and services are distributed by an organization to its end users. Division in an organizational structure represents a product or service line in a single organization.
 
A Sales area is known as entity which is required to process an order in a company. It is comprised of Sales organization, distribution channel and a division.
 
In SAP SD organizational structure, each sales organization is assigned to a company code. Distribution channel and divisions are assigned to Sales organization and all comprise to make a sales area.
9 .
What is the use of Sales area?
A Sales area is known as entity which is required to process an order in a company. It is comprised of Sales organization, distribution channel and a division.
Material management is also one of the key modules in SAP ERP systems, which is interlinked with other modules of SAP R/3. Its primary operations are to keep a record and monitor day-to-day business operations and requirements in the inventory. All these SAP modules are interrelated with each other.
There are so many links between SAP SD and SAP MM. For example, Material Management(MM) is required to create inbound and outbound updates for sales and distribution. Similarly, price details and the availability of the product are taken from MM but are controlled by the sales and distribution module.
 
Orders placed by the customers should be extended to the sales area in an organization, or else it gets difficult or impossible to transact with the material. This shows that these modules are interconnected to each other and all the other modules are interrelated.
12 .
Explain what is the difference between milestone and periodic billing?
Periodic : Full amount in each bill till contract period

Milestone :
Partial amount in each bill till full amount is billed
13 .
Explain how shipping point is determined?
Shipping point is determined by,
 
Shipping Conditions + Loading Group + Delivery Plant = Shipping Point.
Sales Support is one of the prominent modules of the SAP SD, and also it is known as SD-CAS(Computer-Aided Selling). The main objective of this module is to help the enterprises and firms to build new sales, tracking past and existing sales, checking the performance of the sales which helps to improve the sales and marketing of a firm and enterprise. And also this module maintains the list of the intended customers to send the emails which help the organizations to improve their sales.   
Sales order processing is the primary focus of the organization, which is the whole side part of the organization business. Following are the key functions in the sales order processing :  
 
* Checking the availability of the purchased articles.
 
* e-Transfer of documents and printing them.
 
* Checking for incomplete data.
 
* Checking the status updates of sales transactions.
 
* Scheduling goods delivery dates.
 
* Calculation of prices and taxes. 
The Sales Document types available in SAP are.
 
* Credit Memo Request
* Debit Memo Request
* Standard Order
* Returns, etc.

Configuration steps for SAP SD :
 
IMG Menu Path : SPRO > IMG > Sales and Distribution > Sales > Sales Documents > Sales Document Header > Define Sales Document Type.
The representation of certain aspects related to your daily pricing activities is referred as condition types.
 
The path for condition type for pricing is :
 
SAP IMG path : SPRO > SAP Reference IMG > Sales and Distribution > Basic Functions > Pricing > Pricing Control > Define Condition Types.
18 .
Is it possible to create invoices without delivery?
No, invoice is not possible without delivery.
19 .
What is the use of SAP FI in SAP Sales and Distribution?
In case of standard sales order, you create an outbound goods delivery to the customer. Here movement 601 takes place. This movement is configured in MM and movement of goods hit some G/L account in FI.
Link Points Module Involved
Availability Check MM
Credit Check FI
Costing CO/MM
Tax Determination FI
Transfer of Requirements PP/MM
Partner function allows you to identify which functions partner has to be perform in business process. Consider a simplest case, where all the customer functions are performed by partner customer. As these are mandate functions they has to be defined as obligatory functions in SD system.
Below partner types are Customer, Vendor, Personnel, Contact Person and common partner functions as per these partner types are :

Partner Type Partner Function Entry from System Master Record
Customer (CU)

Sold-to party (SP)

Ship-to party (SH)

Bill-to party (BP)

Payer (PY)

Customer number Customer master record
Vendor (V) Forwading agent (fwdg agent) Vendor number Vendor master record
Human resources (HR)

Employee responsible (ER)

Sales personnel (SP)

Personnel number Personnel master record
Contact Person (CP) Contact person (CP) Contact partner number

(created in customer master recors, no master record of its own)

PGI or Post Good Issue is done to keep a record of available goods in stock after the goods are delivered. Good issue transaction cannot be cancelled but can be reversed.
 
The transaction t-code for reverse PGI is VL09. Partial quantity reversal is not possible, in the delivery document you cannot reverse the PGI for one item/ partial quantity.
24 .
Explain what is the difference between SAP credit memo request and SAP Credit Memo?
SAP Credit Memo (T-code VF01) is created on the basis of credit memo request (T-code: Va01). Credit memo request is generated when you have to pay to the customer. (Excess bill or damages or change in the price).
25 .
What is the sales area in SAP SD?
The sales area in SAP SD is the combination of sales organizations, distribution channels, and divisions. It will help us determine what marketing strategy has been adopted by one particular division for improving sales.
26 .
What is the distribution channel in SAP SD?
This channel consists of information and details of the distributed products. This means it keeps the log of all the products and services provided by an organization to its users.
All Sales activities in SAP SD system can be divided into presales and post sales activities. Presales activities are classified as activities which occurs before product is sold to customer and post sales activities are those which occurs after product is sold.
 
Pre Sales Activities : Inquiry, quotation
 
Post Sales Activities : Support, Relationship management
Structure of a Sales Order :
 
An inquiry from a customer consists one or more items that contains the quantity of a material or service entered in the order.
 
The quantity in a Sales order is further divided into business lines and comprise of various subsets and delivering dates.
 
Items in Sales order are combined in a hierarchy and allows to differentiate between batches or to use combinations of materials.
 
All the valid conditions on the items are mentioned in item conditions. These conditions for an item can be derived via a full condition and can be valid for entire sales order.
 
You can divide an item to multiple billing plan deadlines and each tells the time when a fixed amount of the item is to be billed.
 
* VA02 − Edit a Sales Order
* VA03 − Display a Sales Order
* T-Code − VA01 Create a Sales Order
Quotation is a legal document to customer for delivery of goods and services. This is normally issued after an inquiry from customer or without an inquiry.
 
* SAP R/3 Menu

* Logistics Sales and Distribution Sales Quotation Create

* T-Code − VA21
Sales Activity :
 
Sales activities are categorized as Presales and post sales :
 
* This include when you sell material rather you do your preparation for sales with the customer...
 
* Sales Call, Phone Call, Sales Letter, and post sales like support and relationship, etc.
 
Sales documents :
 
These documents are considered under sales, where you sell the materials to the customer and are created in SAP system to manage sales process.
 
Example : Sales orders, Quotations, etc.
There is a customer telephone inquiry in the system and then customer requests a quotation which can be created by referring to same inquiry. Next is the customer place an order on the basis of quotation and a sales order is created by copying the information from the quotation and if any modifications are required.
 
Merchandise is shipped and bill is sent to the customer. After the delivery of goods, customer raises a claim damaged articles, a delivery can be created free of charge with reference to the sales order.
There are two types of contracts, and they go as follows:
 
Value contracts : In a value contract, the vendor has to pay the value, and the value is written accordingly
 
Quantity contracts : On the other hand, in a quality contract, a vendor has to write the terms of the contract according to the quantity of the material being supplied.
33 .
What are schedule line categories?
All the items are divided into schedule lines in a sales document. These scheduled lines are assigned to multiple control elements. These schedule lines contain all the details like delivery dates, quantity, availability in inventory, etc. on the item with scheduled lines are copied to SAP System. 
Copy controls have three different levels in a sales order which goes as follows:
 
Header level : It is used when the system copies the data from the header source document to the target header document.
 
Item level : This is used to find out the status of the line item.
 
Schedule line level : This is only relevant when copying of sales orders is done from the billing document.
During the sales order process, we can also perform manual pricing by manipulating the prices of the items as well as header level. Manual processing is dependent on individual condition types to determine the price. Activities which you can perform goes as follows :
 
* Entering additional pricing elements
* Deleting the pricing element.
* Changing a condition
Proposing a new product is always an excellent strategy to improve the sales performance of any organization. The products recommended might be cheaper, expensive, or similar to the products that are requested by the customer.
 
Automatic product proposal is one power tool that the system uses to market products online. They are capable of matching their market requirement. SAP CRM module is very helpful as it consists of data to make such types of proposals.
Product proposal supports features like :
 
Cross-selling is the relationship between different products. Its rules suggest leading products and sub associated products, Up-selling and down-selling,
 
Top N product list, Proposing accessories, Generating product proposals with respect to specific promotions.
In SAP SD, the process of copying data from the source document to the target document is done by Copy Controls. They consist of program referred as routing that determines how the system will transfer the data. Copy control could be useful for the end users who don’t want to repeat the control parameters from order- to delivery- and then billing.
 
Copy control can be done in following manner :
 
* Sales document by sales document
* Billing document by sales document
* Sales document by delivery
* Sales document by billing document
* Delivery by billing document
At three levels of sales order copy controls are set up Header level, Item level and Schedule line level.
 
VTAA : from sales order to sales order
VTLA : from sales order to delivery
VTAF : from the billing document to sales order
VTFA : from sales order to billing document
VTFL : from delivery to billing document
VTFF : from the billing document to billing document
All these procedures are done in the SAP warehouse management system. All these procedures are done strategically. With all the data in the systems, the SAP SD uses to find the best way to handle the goods and avoid disturbance. There are two types of packing; manual and automatic. There are three types of picking; picking them individually, as per defined intervals, or self pick-up.
A proforma invoice is a reference document which is used for import and export negotiations.
 
The standard proforma invoice document types are listed as under :

* With reference to order – F5
* With reference to delivery – F8
Condition Type Description
PR00 price
K004 Material discount
K005 Customer-specific material discount
K007 Customer discount
K020 Price group discount
KF00 Freight surcharge (by item)
UTX1 State tax
UTX2 Country tax
UTX3 City tax
Outline agreement is a long term purchasing agreement with vendor containing terms and conditions regarding the material that is supplied by vendor.
 
Outline agreement are valid up to certain period of time and cover a certain predefined quantity or value.
Outline agreement is of following two types :
 
Contract : Contract is a long term outline agreement between vendor and ordering party over predefined material or services over certain framework of time. There are two types of contract
 
Scheduling Agreement : A scheduling agreement is defined as an external agreement with the customer and having details of quantity of goods and delivery dates. This information is mentioned as schedule lines In a standard system, Schedule lines can be created with the scheduling agreement or you can also create these at later stage.
Shipping is defined as an important activity in sales process. It comes under logistic chain and guarantees customer service and distribution of goods.
 
It is a component of Sales and Distribution module and is used to perform outbound delivery and other shipping activities like picking and packing of the goods.
 
In shipping process, below are the key sub processes :
 
* Delivery processing of the goods
* Picking of items
* Packing of the goods
* Post goods issue
* Shipping communication
* Planning & monitoring of shipping

To define Modes of Transport, navigate : SPRO IMG Logistics Execution Transportation Basic Transportation Function Routes Define Routes Define modes of transport Execute.
A standard SAP system includes variety of common discount types. You can also define customize discounts and surcharges as per business requirement.
 
Standard SAP system includes below discount types :

Discount (Key) Kind of discount
Customer (K007) Percentage
Material (K004) Absolute
Price group (K020) Percentage
Material group (K029) Absolute discount by weight
Customer/material (K005) Absolute
Customer/material group (K030) Percentage
Price group/material (K032) Absolute
Price group/material group(K030) Percentage
Rebate processing (BO01) Group rebate (%)
Rebate Processing (BO02) Material rebate (fixed)
Rebate processing(BO03) Customer rebate(%)
Inter-company processing (P101) Intercompany discount (fixed)
Inter-company billing (P102) Intercompany discount (%)
Invoice lists (RL00) Factoring discount
Invoice lists (MW15) Factoring discount tax