Technical completion, settlement and the emergency shortcut

When the work is done, two different people close two different things. The maintenance planner technically completes the order: nothing more needs to be done on the machine. Controlling later settles the costs and sets the order to business complete. Keeping the two apart is what allows late costs, such as a contractor's invoice, to still reach the right place.

Technical completion

Rosa sets order 4001250 to TECO, entering a reference date and time that decides which period the work belongs to in maintenance history. SAP's training lists the effects: open reservations and capacities are closed, purchase requisitions not yet converted to POs get a deletion flag, and if no settlement rule exists, the system tries to create one. After TECO, the order can still receive missing time confirmations, outstanding goods movements and invoices, and its settlement rule can be changed. TECO can be reversed if the work was not really finished.

The notification can be completed with the order or separately. Completing it sets NOCO and locks it; it cannot be completed while it has outstanding tasks. The reference date drives which period its data falls into for the maintenance information system.

Settlement and business completion

The order is a cost collector. Settlement moves its actual costs to the receivers in the settlement rule, usually the cost center of the technical object. Orders are normally settled in the period-end run (collectively, for example with KO8G); a single order can be settled with KO88. After settlement leaves the balance at zero and no more costs are expected, controlling sets the order to business complete (status CLSD). If the balance is not zero, SAP blocks business completion.

The emergency shortcut

For a true breakdown, the standard sequence can be too slow. SAP's simplified emergency process (scope item BH2) uses the Report and Repair Malfunction app: the technician creates the malfunction report, plans work items with a work center and spare parts from the object's BOM, checks stock, does the job, records object parts, damage and cause codes, confirms time and completes the report. The app shows one overall status combining system and user statuses. The same notification and order objects sit underneath, so the costs still reach the order and settle the same way.

Settlement depends on configuration owned by controlling: the settlement profile behind the order type decides which receiver types are allowed and whether a settlement rule is required, and the period-end run decides when costs move. Contoso settles maintenance orders monthly, in the first working days of the next period, before Dan's team runs the cost center reports. Orders that should go to a fixed asset, such as a capital rebuild of a winding machine, need a rule that points to the asset or an asset under construction instead of the cost center; that is a decision for Dan, not the planner.

Watch for orders that stay at TECO forever. If settlement fails, for example because the receiver cost center is locked, the order cannot be business completed and its costs never reach the report. A regular list of orders with status TECO but not CLSD, older than one period, is a cheap control that both maintenance and controlling should look at.