Michele Spychalski asked "What transaction can be used to
transmit a bill of material document?"
Susan Carley Oliver responded, "it appears that the 866 is the
BOM."
But, let us look at the purpose and scope of the 866:
"This Draft Standard for Trial Use contains the format and
establishes the data contents of the Production Sequence
Transaction Set (866) for use within the context of an
Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) environment. The transaction
set can be used to provide for the receiver of goods to request
the order in which shipments of goods arrive at one or more
locations, or to specify the order in which the goods are to be
unloaded from the conveyance method, or both. This specifies
the sequence in which the goods are to enter the materials
handling process, or are to be consumed in the production
process, or both. This transaction set shall not be used to
authorize labor, materials, or other resources. This
transaction set shall not be used to revise any product
characteristic specification."
This description does not appear to fit the requirements of a
bill of materials. Examining the X12 transaction 866 itself
shows how awkward it would be to use for that purpose. The bill
of material may have no interest in the production sequence for
manufacturing a product and certainly not if the bill is for a
particular service rather than a product. A bill may be
describing an engineering change specification and, thus, the
866 by its own purpose and scope says it is not the correct
transaction set.
Next Dale Marthaller suggested, "What about an 856 Advance
Shipping Notice?" It appears as if he might have selected it
because it uses an HL segment. I believe the use of an HL
segment is a necessary but not sufficient reason for choosing a
transaction set to use to carry a bill of material. When we
look at the X12 standards we see the complete list of
transaction sets that use the HL segment:
105 111 112 113 132 133 148 155 157 179 186 187 194 196 242 245
248 267 270 271 274 276 277 278 284 286 500 536 561 625 650 805
811 816 837 841 842 847 856 857 858 863 869 870
Again we will look at the purpose and scope of the X12 856:
"This X12 Transaction Set contains the format and establishes
the data contents of the Ship Notice/Manifest Transaction Set
(856) for use within the context of an Electronic Data
Interchange (EDI) environment. The transaction set can be used
to list the contents of a shipment of goods as well as
additional information relating to the shipment, such as order
information, product description, physical characteristics, type
of packaging, marking, carrier information, and configuration of
goods within the transportation equipment. The transaction set
enables the sender to describe the contents and configuration of
a shipment in various levels of detail and provides an ordered
flexibility to convey information.
The sender of this transaction is the organization responsible
for detailing and communicating the contents of a shipment, or
shipments, to one or more receivers of the transaction set. The
receiver of this transaction set can be any organization having
an interest in the contents of a shipment or information about
the contents of a shipment."
Not only is the purpose different, but the structure of the 856
transaction set is not designed as a carrier of a bill of
material. A bill of material is not necessarily concerned with
shipping information. The bill may be describing, in all
aspects, the design of a city park or the specifications for
your new home.
William J. Kammerer was correct, as usual, in suggesting the 841
Specifications/Technical Information transaction set. Using a
bill of material for any type of product was the basis of the
design of the 841. Let us look at its purpose and scope:
"This X12 Transaction Set contains the format and establishes
the data contents of the Specifications/Technical Information
Transaction Set (841) for use within the context of an
Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) environment. The transaction
set can be used to transmit or request specifications or
technical information between trading partners. It can be used
to transmit engineering change and engineering change requests.
It can also be used to allow EDI trading partners the ability to
exchange a complete or partial technical description of a
product, process, service, etc. over the same path as any other
EDI transaction. The detail area can include graphic, text,
parametric, tabular, image, spectral, or audio data. A
transmission includes identification information to assist the
receiver in interpreting and utilizing the information included
in the transaction."
"The detail area of the Specification/Technical Information
Transaction Set provides a structure which allows for the
exchange of a variety of specification information. For
example, if the transaction contains information describing a
complete assembly, it would be necessary to include the assembly
model, the models for each of the individual parts, and the
associated specifications. In the case of a process it may be
necessary to transmit the specification of the product along
with the specifications of the process and raw materials. This
transaction set can also be linked to other transaction sets."
A material bill of material is one specific example of a
specification. Thus, this is the single X12 transaction set
that was designed to carry a bill of material, no matter how
complex, and independent of its structure. Mr Kammerer's
mention of the specification of a Boeing 777 was specifically
one of the many examples discussed within Product Data when this
transaction set was designed. The 841 does employ the HL
segment. In fact, the 841 was one of the first if not the first
transaction set to be approved with an HL segment.
Thus, the 841 is the one correct response to the question
originally asked by Michele Spychalski - "What transaction can
be used to transmit a bill of material document?"
There is a technical report on the 841 that is available from
the X12 secretariat, DISA.
If you have any questions on the application of this transaction
set after you have read the technical report, or on any other
Product Data transaction, I shall be glad to offer what
assistance I am able.
Any organization involved in the design or production of a
product should also be aware of the full set of transaction sets
developed by the Product Data subcommittee of X12. For example,
several weeks ago someone asked in this forum about a
transaction set to track the life of a medical product so as to
be able to report any problems to the FDA. The family of
product service transaction sets TS 140 thru 143 provides the
complete answer. They are:
140 - Product Registration
142 - Product Service Claim
141 - Product Service Claim Response
143 - Product Service Notification
These product service transaction sets were designed to cover
warranty situations or reporting to governmental organizations
for products as diverse as heavy duty trucks to medical
products.
A partial list of other Product Data transactions that should be
remembered are:
842 - Nonconformance Report
848 - Material Safety Data Sheet
863 - Report of Test Results
All Product Data transactions were to be used across all
industries and organizations including government.
I believe the exercise in answering the original question
demonstrates the need for anyone working with EDI to have the
set of X12 standards and list of ancillary X12 publications all
of which are available from the X12 secretariat, The Data
Interchange Standards Association (DISA).
Peter Randlev X12 IM
27 Silver Lake Road
Rhinebeck, New York 12572 - 3109
845 / 266 - 3350
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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