Tomerlin Knowledge Center

Epicor® ADVANCED Modules

Epicor® Job Scheduling | Finite and Infinite | Planning and Scheduling

Benefits of Job Scheduling

The Expected Benefit

  1. Deliver on Time

The Unexpected Benefits

  1. Gain More Trust from Customers
  2. Accurately Promise Ship Dates for New Sales
  3. Reduce WIP
  4. Free Up Capital
  5. Free Up Space on Your Production
  6. Increase Sales to Both Old and New Customers

Do your customers demand on-time delivery? You have so many challenges every day. It can be quite daunting without the right tools. There is only one utility in any ERP software that has the agility to meet this critical customer requirement. That tool is finite job planning and scheduling. Finite scheduling has only two objectives; 1) first, it attempts to have every job completed on time so delivery dates can be met, and 2) if any jobs cannot be finished on time, it attempts to minimize their lateness to the extent possible. If you have hundreds of open, active jobs on your shop floor, you must use finite job scheduling.

Customers consider Tomerlin-ERP as the expert at Epicor Kinetic Job Scheduling. Tomerlin-ERP consultants know that once finite job scheduling is implemented and deployed, it is critical to have information the finite scheduling module collects each night be both timely and accurate.

Don Agostino, Tomerlin-ERP’s Training Manager, while at Epicor, developed the training materials for both Epicor’s engineering and scheduling classes. Contact us now, and one of our scheduling consultants will assist you with implementing finite job scheduling for your shop floor.

Some functions of Advanced Planning and Scheduling:

Automated Scheduling by Capability – Define a capability or skill level and tie it to multiple resources rather than define a resource group or individual resource in the planning process. Based on the available resources, the APS determines the order in which each job operation is performed on each resource.

Dependent Capabilities – Link dependent capabilities with the primary capability when operations require dependent skills to perform the operation.

Finite or Infinite Capacity –Define each resource’s capacity as either finite or infinite. When an operation in the schedule is moved, the resource is rescheduled.

Material Constraints – Use an existing method of manufacture to consider material availability as a scheduling constraint. Integrated directly with Inventory and Purchasing, APS knows when the material is due and schedules accordingly.

Epicor will enable you to achieve your goal of shipping on time and more. Manufacturers with experience rely on Epicor Advanced Planning and Scheduling to make a difference for their customers.

Critical Components of Epicor Kinetic Finite Job Scheduling

The Epicor scheduling engine handles the supply and demand through three main components – Capacity, Load, and Scheduling Blocks. The purpose of each element is discussed here, but these items are explored in more detail later within the Primary Components information.

  • Capacity – This component measures how much time or production output (non-time capacity) is available for the resources within your manufacturing center; capacity represents the supply available. Each resource has a capacity limit that is available during each working day. Depending on how you want the scheduling engine to handle capacity, resources can or cannot be assigned more demand than can be satisfied through their capacity. A resource can have either finite or infinite capacity.
  • Load – This component measures how operations require much time or production output to complete part quantities. The load required for each job is calculated by the part quantity needed, the operations required to complete production, and the availability of resources to complete the job’s part quantity. Load represents the demand placed against the schedule—the amount of time or production output that the resource needs to complete the operation.
  • Scheduling Blocks – Use Scheduling Blocks to calculate the amount of load required to complete an operation. A scheduling block is a record that measures the length of time during which work will be done on one operation. First, the scheduling engine determines how much time it will take to complete the operation. Then the engine calculates how many scheduling blocks are required to handle the load. The length of these time allocation records will vary, depending upon the quantity produced, the number of resources (machines or operators) available, whether the operation can be divided, and so on. When the scheduling engine calculates how many blocks will handle the load, it checks how much capacity in time is available on the resources that will complete the operations. At this point, each block resembles a puzzle piece, as the engine tries to fit each block into a segment of open time on a resource. The job is scheduled when all blocks are placed into the resource’s time.

Planning and Scheduling Experts

Epicor® Software has told Tomerlin-ERP that fewer than 5% of its worldwide customer base of 30,000 active installations has successfully implemented Finite Job Scheduling. This has not been the experience of Tomerlin-ERP. In our opinion, Finite Job Scheduling is the most powerful module in Epicor ERP software. If you want to Ship On-Time, Reduce Work-In-Process, Release Tied Up Capital for other uses, and Increase Sales without asking for the order, then you need the right tools. Contact Tomerlin-ERP now at 818-887-9162.