Business Partner in SAP – Complete SAP BP Configuration Steps

In SAP S4 Hana, a Business Partner is generally used to centrally manage master data for a business partner, customers, and vendors/ suppliers. Business Partner is a single point of entry to creating, editing, display master data for business partners, customers, and vendors.

A Business Partner can be a person, person, organization, group of people or a group of organizations in which a company has a business interest. A business partner consists of general data like

  • Name
  • Address
  • Bank information.

In the SAP ECC R/3 system, Customer master data and vendor master data will be created with different objects. For customers, we can have views of

  • General Views
  • Finance Views
  • Sales Views

And Similarly for the vendor, we have a view of

  • General Views
  • Finance Views
  • Purchase
  • Financial Views

To create all these objects, we need to execute different transaction codes in SAP

  • For Customer – XD01, FD01, VD01
  • For Vendor – XK01, FK01, MK01

In the SAP S4 Hana system, we can create all customer objects and vendor objects with a single transaction code “BP”

 

SAP Business Partner Configuration Steps

The implementation of Business Partner in SAP involves various customization steps. Refer to below for the step-by-step procedure to set up BP in the SAP S4 Hana system.

1. Define Account Group for Vendors

2. Maintain number range intervals for vendor accounts

3. Assign number intervals to Vendor Account Group

4. Define account groups for customers

5. Maintain number range intervals for customer accounts

6. Assign number range intervals to customer account group

7. Activate PPO requests for platform objects in the dialog

8. Activate Synchronization Options

9. Define BP grouping and assign number ranges

10. Define BP roles for customers

11. Define BP role for vendors

12. Define BP role for direction vendor to BP

13. Define BP Role for direction customer to BP

14. Define number assignment for direction BP to vendor

 

Step 1: Define Account Group for Vendors

You can Account groups for vendors using

  • Transaction code OBD3 or
  • IMG Path: SAP Customizing Implementation Guide > Financial Accounting > Accounts Receivable and Accounts Payable > Vendor Accounts > Master Data > Preparation for Creating Vendor Master Data > Define Account Groups with Screen Layout (Vendors)

Here is a step-by-step procedure to create vendor account groups in SAP S4 Hana

 

Step 2: Maintain number range intervals for vendor accounts

You can define number range intervals for vendor accounts using

Transaction Code: XKN1

IMG Menu Path: SAP Customizing Implementation Guide > Financial Accounting > Accounts Receivable and Accounts Payable > Vendor Accounts > Master Data > Preparation for Creating Vendor Master Data > Create Number Ranges for Vendor Accounts

Here is a step-by-step procedure to define number ranges for vendor accounts in S4 Hana

 

Step 3: Assign number ranges to vendor account groups

You can assign number ranges to vendor accounts group using the following transaction code and menu path

  • Transaction code: OBAS
  • SAP IMG Path: SAP Customizing Implementation Guide > Financial Accounting > Accounts Receivable and Accounts Payable > Vendor Accounts > Master Data > Preparation for Creating Vendor Master Data > Assign Number ranges to Vendor account groups

Here step by step configuration steps on how to assign number ranges to vendor account groups in SAP S4 Hana

 

Step 4: Define Customer Account Groups

You can define customer account groups in SAP S4 Hana by using the following t-code and menu path

  • Transaction code: OBD2
  • SAP IMG Path: SAP Customizing Implementation Guide > Financial Accounting > Accounts Receivable and Accounts Payable > Customer Accounts > Master Data > Preparation for Creating Customer Master Data > Define Account Groups with Screen Layout (Customers)

Here a step by step configuration steps to define customer account groups in SAP S4 Hana

 

Step 5: Define Number Ranges for Customer Account Groups

You can define number ranges for customer accounts by using the following

  • Transaction Code: XDN1
  • IMG Menu Path: SAP Customizing Implementation Guide > Financial Accounting > Accounts Receivable and Accounts Payable > Vendor Accounts > Master Data > Preparation for Creating Vendor Master Data > Create Number Ranges for Customer Accounts

Here a step by step configuration steps to maintain number ranges intervals for customer account groups in SAP S4 Hana

 

Step 6: Assign number range intervals to customer account group

You can assign assigned customer number range intervals to customer account groups using

  • Transaction code: OBAR
  • SAP IMG Path: SAP Customizing Implementation Guide > Financial Accounting > Accounts Receivable and Accounts Payable > Vendor Accounts > Master Data > Preparation for Creating Vendor Master Data > Assign Number ranges to Customer account groups

Here a step by step configuration steps – how to assign number range intervals to customer account groups in SAP S4 Hana

 

7. Activate PPO requests for platform objects in the dialog

Select the PPO active against synchronization object BP. You can activate PPO requests for platform objects by using the navigation menu path

Cross-Application Components > Master Data Synchronization > Synchronization Control -> Synchronization Control -> Activate PPO Requests for Platform Objects in the Dialog

Here a complete configuration steps – how to activate PPO requests for platform objects in the dialog

 

8. Activate Synchronization Options

Synchronization options enable to synchronize between BP and customers/vendors in SAP. You can activate the synchronization option by using the navigation path:

Cross-Application Components > Master Data Synchronization > Synchronization Control -> Synchronization Control -> Activate Synchronization Options

Here are the complete steps to refer – how to activate synchronization options.

 

9. Define BP grouping and assign number ranges

In this step, you will define Business partner grouping and assign the number ranges for BP group.

SAP IMG Menu Path: SAP Customizing Implementation Guide -> Cross Application Components -> SAP Business Partners -> Business Partner -> Basic Settings -> Define Groups and Assign Number ranges.

Here is a complete step-by-step procedure – how to define BP groupings and assign number ranges

 

10. Define BP roles for customers

You can define business partner roles for customers as per requirements using the following menu path

Cross-Application Components -> SAP Business Partner -> Business Partner -> Basic Settings -> Business Partner Roles -> Define BP Roles.

Continue to read – How to define BP roles for customers

 

11. Define BP’s role for vendors

SAP system delivers standard BP roles for vendors, however, you can define customer Business partner roles by using the menu path

Cross-Application Components -> SAP Business Partner -> Business Partner -> Basic Settings -> Business Partner Roles -> Define BP Roles.

Here is a complete step-by-step procedure – How to define business partner role for vendors

 

12. Define BP’s role in direction vendor to BP

You can define BP’s role for direction vendor to business partner by using the following menu path

Cross-Application Components -> Master Data Synchronization -> Customer/Vendor Integration -> Business Partner Settings -> Settings for Vendor Integration -> Define BP Role for Direction Vendor to BP

Here is a step-by-step procedure – How to define BP role for direction vendor to BP

 

13. Define BP Role for direction customers to BP

You can define BP’s role in direction customer to business partner by using the following img path

SAP Customizing Implementation Guide > Cross-Application Components -> Master Data Synchronization -> Customer/Vendor Integration -> Business Partner Settings -> Settings for Customer Integration -> Define BP Role for Direction Customer to BP

Step-by-step procedure – How to define BP role for direction customer to BP.

 

14. Define number assignment for direction BP to vendor

In this step you assign the vendor account group to the business partner group, which you can configure by using the following menu path

Cross-Application Components > Master Data Synchronization > Customer/Vendor Integration > Business Partner Settings > Settings for Vendor Integration > Field Assignment for Vendor Integration > Assign Keys > Define Number Assignment for Direction BP to Vendor

Here is a step-by-step assignment configuration – how to define number assignment for direction BP to vendor.