Account Management in SAP CRM

Overview
Almost all business transactions in an organization involve certain stakeholders like
employee, contact person, organizational unit, etc.
Within SAP CRM these participants involved in a business transaction are maintained
as CRM Business Partner. Following can be involved in a business transaction as
Business Partner:



Examples of Business Partner


In SAP CRM, business partners are created centrally. Also the roles that a business
partner play, such as sold-to party and ship-to party are also maintained centrally
Thus a business partner created in SAP CRM can be involved in any of the business
transaction in different modules like sales, marketing and service. This involvement of
the business partner in a business transaction depends upon the role assigned to the
business partner and the partner functions involved in the business transaction
Creating and maintenance of the business partner in the SAP CRM is included in
the Account Managementapplication within CRM Web UI. In order to work on the
business partner, the user need to have access to the Account management in the Web
UI:



Account Management with option to maintain Business Partner




Business Partners Involved in a Business Transaction



For a particular business transaction, involved business partners can be found within the
Parties Involved assignment block:
Within SAP GUI, business partner maintenance is available with transaction code BP.
SAP has now stopped supporting GUI for CRM transactions and thus Web UI is used
for the business partner creation and maintenance
Account management in CRM Web UI provides 360
0
view of the business partner data
which means it represents complete data of the business partner including:
o the header details of the business partner
o relationships to other business partners in the business processes
o account life cycle of the business partner
o business transactions in which the business partner is involved
o change history of the business partner data
Using CRM Middleware it's possible to populate business partners in SAP CRM using
data maintained in SAP ERP. Also updates in the business partner data in any of these
systems (ERP or CRM) can be synchronized through the CRM Middleware
Below is the SPRO path for Business partner customizing. The Partner Processing
implemented for a particular business transaction also depends upon the customizing
settings implemented for the business partners. Thus the customizing settings for the
business partners in CRM are implemented in the SPRO and once done, CRM Web UI
is used to create and maintain the business partners



SPRO to maintain Business Partner related customizing


Business Partner Category
SAP CRM supports three possible categories:
o Person or Individual
o Group
o Organization
A business partner can belong to any one of these categories. An account can be
further sub-divided as follows-
o Account: An account is a company, group, or individual, with which your
organization have a business relationship.
Accounts are further divided into:
Corporate Account (organizations or companies)
Individual Account (individuals)
Groups (Groups like households)
o Contact
person with whom you have a business relationship
mostly assigned to a corporate account
o Employee
member of your organization
involved in interaction between your organization and vendor, prospect,
customer, and other parties



Business Partner categories


It is not possible to modify these categories or to create new categories.
When a business partner is created in SAP CRM, category is assigned to it. The
business partner category can only assign once while the creation of the business
partner and cannot be modified at later stages of the business partner life cycle. Thus
while creating a business partner you need to select the category as the first step. Also,
the account search can be filter based upon the account category for faster results:



Search page for accounts in Web UI


This business partner category is also used in the header of the account display, create
and modify page:



Page title for an Account mentions the Account Type "Individual Account"


Business Partner Grouping
When a business partner is created, a number termed as "business partner number" is
assigned to it.This number can be configured in the SPRO customizing such that it is
generated automatically when a business partner is created
For this, Business Partner Grouping and Number Ranges are used
We define range of numbers using start and end value (within SAP CRM this is
termed as "Number Range" and has an identifier):



Number Range in SPRO settings


For example, from the above screen shot, business partner with number range 01 will
be assigned a number '4907620' , while business partner with number range 02 will be
assigned number 'A'
Number range can be Internal or External
Internal Number Range
o Based up on the customizing settings this is generated within the CRM system
o This is a sequential number from the relevant number range
External Number Range
o In this case, number can be assigned by the user while creating the record
o Or the number can be derived from an external system
o In both cases the number used must lie within the corresponding number range
interval
This number range is then assigned to a grouping
SPRO path to assign Number Range to Group:
o IMG -> Cross-Application Components -> SAP Business Partner -> Business
Partner -> Number Ranges and Grouping -> Define Groupings and Assign Number
Ranges
Business Partner Grouping is basically different number ranges that could be assigned
to a business partner.Thus Grouping can be considered as a container which holds the
Number Range settings
While creating a BP, user selects the Grouping
Selected grouping identifies the number to be generated
If the grouping is using an Internal number range, the business partner number will
be auto assigned while saving the Business Partner
For the Grouping corresponding to external number ranges
o ID field can be enabled for user to give a Business Partner number or
o BP number can be fetched from external system (e.g. connected ERP)



Create page for an Individual Account


Business Partner Roles
The BP (Business Partner) roles assigned to a business partner reflect the partner's
functions and the business transactions in which the partner may be involved.
It is possible to assign more than one business partner role to a business partner
o This means a business partner can be involved in different business transactions
with different roles
o But the general information of the business partner like name, address, etc. are
entered only once
It is possible to create custom BP roles as per the business requirement



Business Role settings in SPRO I


A business partner role is assigned to a business partner role category



Business Role settings in SPRO II


BP Role Category controls properties of the BP role:



Business Role settings in SPRO III


There is a separate assignment block in the Accounts Overview for the BP Roles.
The drop down list shows the available roles that can be assigned to the account.
Using the Insert button it is possible to assign new role to a business partner:



Business Role Assignment Block in Web UI


BP Relationships
A business partner can have relation with another business partner.
A connection between two business partners is formed using the "business partner
relationships".
Within SAP CRM, relationship between business partners is described with business
partner relationship category:



Business Partner Relationship settings in SPRO I


These BP Relationship Category defines the properties of the business partner
relationship:



Business Partner Relationship settings in SPRO II


A BP Relationship can be unidirectional or bidirectional
BP Relationships can be assigned to a business partner in Web UI in the Relationship
assignment block:
o This updates all the Business Partners involved in the relations
o Existing relationship can be modified using the 'Actions' buttons



Business Partner Relationship Assignment Block in Web UI


It is possible to have a relationship time dependent. Thus the relationship will be valid
for the time frame specified while the creation of this relationship
Using the New button in above screenshot it is possible to create new relation:
Account Classification
SAP CRM provides functionality of account classification using which you can
classify your accounts according to any criteria. This is particularly useful when a
large enterprise needs to classify different business areas according to different criteria
It is possible to perform search for accounts based upon these classification criterion
Account classification is also available as an individual assignment block on the
Account page:



Account Classification Assignment Block in Web UI


The role in this assignment block is different from the Business Partner Role. You can
define any number of Criteria and Attributes
As per the requirement account criteria can be combined to create Classification
Category. Each classification category can consist of up to 5 criteria and any number
of attributes as per the requirement
Constituents of account classification are defined in the SPRO customizing
There is a helper class associated with each criteria and attribute for the value help as
drop down list in the Web UI
Criteria definition:



Account Classification settings in SPRO II


Attribute definition:



Account Classification settings in SPRO III


Assignment of attributes:

Account Classification settings in SPRO IV
Assigning Criteria:



Account Classification settings in SPRO V


360
0
View of Business Partner



Linked Documents within individual Assignment Blocks in Web UI



SAP CRM provides 360
0
view of the business partner. This means that all the data related
to the business partner can be checked in one place. In the header data it is possible to
maintain and display the data which is applicable in all scenarios like the first name, last
name, BP number, etc. There are separate assignment blocks for data like BP Role, BP
Relationship, etc. Also we can find all the business transactions within which the
business partner is involved. For example, there is an assignment block "Opportunities"
which displays all the
opportunity
business transactions in which the business partner is involved
It is possible to navigate to the corresponding business transaction document from
these assignment block data. Also, we can create new business transactions through
these assignment block. That is, using the new button on Opportunity block it is
possible to navigate to the Opportunity page and create an opportunity with respect to
the business partner
Thus, the SAP CRM supports the maintenance of the complete business partner life
cycle in single place which makes it convenient for the end user to use and helps in the
reporting purpose