Review impact of purchase order changes from vendors (production-ready preview)

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[This article is prerelease documentation and is subject to change.]

Impact analysis can automatically run based on supplier changes received through emails or the vendor collaboration interface. Whichever options you configure also show the results of the impact analysis for review directly in Dynamics 365 Supply Chain Management, so purchasers can decide how to respond in their existing workflow.

Set up sources that automatically trigger impact analysis

To use impact analysis on incoming change requests received through emails or the vendor collaboration interface, first enable the relevant sources. Learn more in Supplier communications features of the Procurement Agent (production-ready preview) and Vendor collaboration with external vendors.

To enable impact analysis to run based on change requests coming through one or both sources, follow these steps:

1. Sign in to the Supply Chain Management environment as a user who has permissions to manage the agent configuration.
2. Go to Agents > Agents.
3. Open the Library tab.
4. Find the Show impact of changes in purchase orders - Impact analysis - Procurement Agent tile and select Select for that tile.
5. Open the Source dropdown list and select one or both of the following options:
   • Vendor emails – Select this option if you're using supplier communications features of the Procurement Agent to receive and classify emails from vendors.
   • Vendor collaboration module – Select this option if you're using the vendor collaboration interface to receive and manage vendor responses.
6. Select Activate.

Review changes received via email (supplier communications)

The supplier communications features of the Procurement Agent classify whether emails from vendors are confirmations, change requests, or related to something else (indicated as Other). If you enable impact analysis, it runs automatically for all the change requests you receive. If an email that the system classifies as a Change request in the list pane is shown as Has impact, it means that it includes either a purchase order header or line change that Has impact.

Vendors can communicate changes to both purchase order headers and lines. For example, the whole purchase order can be delayed, specific lines can have delays or quantity changes, or a combination of these changes can occur. For this reason, there's an Impact column on both the Purchase order header and Purchase order lines grids.

The system runs the impact analysis for purchase order line changes only. If a delay to an entire purchase order is communicated, that delay applies to the purchase order header, the Procurement Agent propagates this delay to all of the lines in that purchase order, and runs an impact analysis on all lines individually. Any line-level changes always take precedence, so if a delay to the purchase order header is communicated, but one line is even more delayed, the Procurement Agent runs the impact analysis on the line-level delay.

To review if changes have downstream impact, follow these steps:

1. Open the (Preview) Emails from vendors page by doing one of the following steps:

   • Go to Procurement and sourcing > Purchase order receipt and follow-up to open the Purchase order receipt and follow-up workspace. Then select the (Preview) Emails from vendors tile.
   • Go to Procurement and sourcing > (Preview) Procurement Agent - Supplier communications > (Preview) Emails from vendors.

2. Select an email classified as a Change request in the list pane, and then look at the grids on the Summary FastTab, where changed field values are highlighted in bold. These changes can be on the purchase order header and/or lines.

3. Check the Impact column on both the Purchase order header and Purchase order line grids. It shows one of the following values based on the impact analysis results: Has impact or No impact.

   1. If a change to a Purchase order header Has impact, this condition means that a purchase order header delay causes at least one line to have downstream impact. If there isn't a header change, but instead line-level changes, check the Impact column on the Purchase order lines grid.
   2. Purchase order line changes can show the following results:
      • Has impact - Change affects downstream orders and/or inventory levels.
      • No impact - Change can be safely accepted.

4. Expand the Impact of purchase order line FastTab to see a brief summary of each line change that Has impact.

5. To view the full impact analysis of a change that Has impact, select the View details button. The Impact analysis page opens. Learn more about this page in the Impact analysis details page section later in this article.

Review changes received via vendor collaboration interface

When vendors respond to purchase orders through the vendor collaboration interface, you can review proposed changes and their downstream effects directly from the purchase order preparation workspace. If you enabled impact analysis for the vendor collaboration source, the impact results are available alongside the vendor's response so you can decide how to proceed. To review the impact of changes received through the vendor collaboration interface, follow these steps:

1. Go to Procurement and sourcing > Workspaces > Purchase order preparation.
2. On the Orders FastTab, open the In external review requires action tab.
3. Find and select a purchase order with a Vendor response status of Accepted with changes.
4. To view more details about the impact of the proposed change on the selected purchase order, do one of the following steps:
   • On the toolbar, select View impact analysis to open the Impact analysis page, which is described in the next section.
   • On the toolbar, select View responses to latest sent order to open the vendor's proposed changes. In the Purchase order line impact section, review the impact summary and select View details to see the full impact analysis on the Impact analysis page, which is described in the next section.

Impact analysis details page

The Impact analysis page opens when you select View details from either the email-based workflow or the vendor collaboration workflow. This page shows all the downstream effects of the proposed change in one place. The Impact analysis page includes a summary of the impact, a detailed list of impacted orders, and a detailed list of inventory impacts, including a graph that shows projected inventory levels over time. The following subsections describe the various parts of the Impact analysis page.

Filter and item information

The Filter by section shows key information about the purchase order and item affected by the proposed change, along with a selector to switch between different lines if the purchase order has multiple lines. If you're using master planning, you can also select the link to see the net requirements details for how the impact was calculated. The information in this section helps you understand which item and purchase order line you're analyzing, and gives you quick access to related information and planning details.

This section provides the following information and features:

• The Purchase order line being shown, which provides a drop-down list that lets you select a line for multi-line purchase orders.
• The Item number and Item name being analyzed.
• An Open net requirements link, which opens the detailed planning logic used for the impact calculation if you're using master planning.

Purchase order line impact

The Purchase order line impact FastTab provides an AI-generated summary of the downstream impact, including specific mentions of affected orders and inventory problems. The agent analyzes the full impact details and provides a concise natural language explanation to give you a quick overview before you dive into detailed tables and graphs.

Impacted orders

The Impacted orders FastTab shows a detailed table of all downstream orders affected by the purchase order change. It includes sales orders, production orders, transfer orders, safety stock orders, and forecasts that the proposed change impacts. This detailed view helps you understand exactly which orders are affected and how, so you can make informed decisions about accepting the change and communicating with relevant stakeholders.

Each row in the grid on the Impacted orders FastTab provides the following information about the impacted order:

Column	Description
Order type	Sales order, Production order, Transfer order, Safety stock order, or Forecast
Order number	Specific order ID
Customer/reference	Customer name for sales orders, or production/transfer number
Tracing method	How the order is linked: Pegging (from planning) or Marking (explicit reservation)

Use the View order, View item, and View customer buttons to open related pages in Supply Chain Management.

If this table is empty, the change has no direct impact on specific orders.

Impacted inventory

The Impacted inventory FastTab shows whether the purchase order change causes inventory to drop below safety stock or go negative. The following table summarizes the columns shown on the Impacted inventory FastTab:

Column	Description
Site	The site where inventory is affected.
Warehouse	The warehouse where inventory is affected.
Expected inventory level	Shows one of the following values to indicate how the change impacts inventory levels: Below minimum – Inventory drops below configured safety stock level but remains positive. You still have inventory, but your safety buffer is consumed. Negative – Inventory goes below zero (complete stockout). You can't fulfill orders from on-hand inventory.
Expected impact date	The date when the inventory breach occurs.
Product dimensions	Shows the specific product variant affected (such as configuration, size, color, style) if the item has product dimensions configured.

The inventory projection graph on the Impacted inventory FastTab visualizes inventory levels over time, showing how the purchase order change affects your projected inventory. The graph includes a legend with two lines:

• Projected inventory before change – Shows expected inventory levels based on the original purchase order and plan (displayed as a stepped line).
• Projected inventory after change – Shows projected inventory levels if you accept the vendor's proposed change (displayed as a stepped line). If the after-change line drops below the safety stock reference line, this condition is highlighted as a Below minimum impact. If it goes below zero, it is highlighted as a Negative impact.

The two lines might diverge without resulting in an impact, which means that projected inventory levels after the vendor change might be lower, but still above minimum level.

Additional visual elements:

• X-axis – Timeline showing dates
• Y-axis – Inventory quantity
• Horizontal reference lines – Show the safety stock threshold if available

Important

This projection is based on current planning data. It shows what would happen if you accept the change, but the plan isn't updated yet. Once you accept the change and update the purchase order, planning needs to run to create the new official plan.

Accept a change and apply it to the purchase order

Purchasers can accept changes that:

• Have no or low downstream impact.
• Have an impact, but the purchaser decides to accept the change anyway. This decision might be because there's no other option but to accept. The purchaser might have followed up with the supplier to request options such as expedited production or shipping and split deliveries, but concluded that nothing else can be done.

To accept changes without going back to the purchase order, see one of the following articles based on how you receive changes from vendors:

• To accept changes processed by the supplier communications features of the Procurement Agent, see Review and apply purchase order changes received in vendor emails.
• To accept changes when received through the vendor collaboration interface, see Updating a PO when a vendor suggests changes.

When purchasers choose to accept a change that has a downstream impact, they now have a clear understanding of that impact and can communicate it directly to the relevant stakeholders.