Understanding Transfer Transactions to GL

An Oracle White Paper

June 2004

Understanding Transfer Transactions to GL Page 1

 Understanding Transfer Transactions to GL

INTRODUCTION

This white paper is an effort to provide an understanding on the dataflow

for Transfer Transactions to General Ledger (GL) process. It highlights
the phases of the transfer process and the tables impacted.

ABSTRACT

Transfer Transactions to GL process transfers inventory/work in process

activity for a given period into the general ledger interface. The concurrent
program (executable - INCTGL) picks up records with gl_batch_id = –1
from the table mtl_transaction_accounts, for the entered program
parameters, and transfers them to the gl_interface table.
This paper highlights the steps involved in this process and provides an
overview to the tables impacted.
Note: The paper has been written with Oracle Application Release 11i in
mind (11.5.9 to be specific). The screen shots indicated pertain to the 11i.

SCOPE

1. Functional Overview to the process

2. Technical Overview to the process; including an overview to the tables
impacted
3. Transfer to GL Flowchart
4. Running Transfer to GL

Understanding Transfer Transactions to GL Page 2

FUNCTIONAL OVERVIEW

The accounting information related to transactions in Oracle Inventory and

Oracle Work in Process modules is held in relevant tables within these
modules. However, they need to be accounted in General Ledger (GL) for
proper consolidation. The accounting information related to transactions in
Oracle Inventory and Oracle Work in Process modules is transferred to
GL by running the ‘Transfer Transactions to GL’ concurrent program.
This program is automatically called when the ‘Period End Process
(INCTPC)’ is run. However, it can also be explicitly run at any time
during an open period. When the process is run with more than one period
open, all the transactions from the earliest open period to the date up to
which the process is run (Transfer Date) are considered for transfer to GL.

On running the ‘Transfer Transactions to GL’ program, the accounting

information is inserted into gl_interface table. ‘Journal Import’ and ‘Post
Journals’ processes in Oracle General Ledger can then be used to post the
information in General Ledger.

The level of detail that is transferred to GL for the accounting information

related to these transactions depends on the value chosen in the
Organization Parameters Screen (Navigation: Oracle Inventory > Setup >
Organization > Parameters).

The possible values for the ‘Transfer to GL’ field (in Organization
Parameters Screen) are – Detail, Summary, None.

If ‘Summary’ is selected, the accounting information pertaining to the

transactions is summarized and the summary entries are posted to GL. The
advantage of running the process in 'Summary' mode over 'Detail' mode is
minimising the posting times. Transferring detail transaction distributions
to the general ledger increases general ledger posting times due to the
number of records created.

If ‘Detail’ is selected, detailed accounting entries are transferred to GL. In

this case, the posting times are larger due to a larger number of records.
However, the advantage of this mode is creation of detailed accounting
records in GL for every transaction in Inventory/WIP.

If none is selected, no transfer of accounting information to GL is done for

this organization. This setting plays an important role, when both Periodic
and Perpetual Costing methods are being used in an organization within
the same set of books. The application then, prohibits creation of
accounting distributions for Perpetual accounting if periodic accounting is
used, but it will allow the Periodic accounting transactions to go through.

Understanding Transfer Transactions to GL Page 3

Parameters

Name Description
Organization Code An inventory organization, for which the gl transfer has
to be done.

Date A date in any open period.

When more than one period is open, the transfer selects

transactions from the first open period up to this entered
transfer date.

For summary transfers, this entered date is assigned as

the date for summarized transactions for that open period.

Current Period This value would default from the ‘Date’ parameter
above. This is the open period containing the above date.

Description Some appropriate text.

Understanding Transfer Transactions to GL Page 4

TECHNICAL OVERVIEW

The ‘Transfer Transactions to GL’ concurrent program calls the

executable INCTGL which resides in the $INV_TOP/bin directory.

Following are the main tables accessed by the program:

Table Name Important Columns Type of

Access
GL_INTERFACE GROUP_ID, REFERENCE21, REFERENCE22, Insert
ACCOUNTING_DATE,
USER_JE_CATEGORY_NAME,
GL_SL_LINK_TABLE

MTL_TRANSACTION_A GL_BATCH_ID , TRANSACTION_ID, Select/Updat

CCOUNTS TRANSACTION_DATE e

WIP_TRANSACTION_AC GL_BATCH_ID , TRANSACTION_ID, Select/Updat

COUNTS TRANSACTION_DATE e

MTL_PARAMETERS GENERAL_LEDGER_UPDATE_CODE Select

ORG_GL_BATCHES GL_BATCH_ID, GL_BATCH_DATE, Insert/Delete

ACCT_PERIOD_ID, ORGANIZATION_ID /Update

ORG_ACCT_PERIODS ACCT_PERIOD_ID, ORGANIZATION_ID, Select

PERIOD_NAME, OPEN_FLAG

ORG_ORGANIZATION_ Select
DEFINITIONS

GL_SET_OF_BOOKS Select

Details of Tables Impacted

MTL_TRANSACTION_ACCOUNTS

Mtl_transaction_accounts holds the accounting information for each

material transaction in mtl_material_transactions. The summarized details
of the transaction are written into this table.
The process transfer to GL picks transactions with gl_batch_id of –1 from
this table and passes them to gl_interface. When it passes the transactions
to the gl_interface it is at this time that the batch is given it’s proper batch
number. This is used to overwrite the gl_batch_id and update it.

The transaction_values and base_transaction_values are transferred to the

GL_INTERFACE table through the period close or GL transfer process,
and until this process is run, the gl_batch_id is -1.

Understanding Transfer Transactions to GL Page 5

Form For This Table
Navigation: Inventory/Transactions/ Material Distribution or in the
Material Transactions form click on button “Distribution”.
This is to view transaction distribution against different accounts.
Reference Oracle Inventory User’s Guide 11, page 7-46.

Distribution of Accounts

In this table, the gl_batch_id will have a value of (-1) until the records
have been posted to the General Ledger. The transaction_id is the primary
key and it will match the transaction_id in the
MTL_MATERIAL_TRANSACTIONS table. However, every record in
the MTL_MATERIAL_TRANSACTIONS table will have at least two
records in the mtl_transaction_accounts for asset items. One record will
represent credit against an account and one record will represent debit
against an account. For expense items there will be no records in this
table.

Once the records have been transferred to the General Ledger we cannot
identify the corresponding record in the mtl_transaction_accounts table.

If customer is out of balance, confirm the reference_account is not (-1).

The join between records in the GL_INTERFACE table to records in the
mtl_transaction_accounts table is by doing the GL Transfer in detail mode
instead of summary mode. When using detail mode the gl transfer will
insert the GL_BATCH_ID into the reference23 column in the
GL_INTERFACE table. The same batch id will exist in
mtl_transaction_accounts table for the gl_batch_id column. When
performing gl transfer process in summary the reference23 field is not
updated; therefore, no link will be available between these two tables.
Expense items get posted to GL through Purchasing.

Check for records in the following tables:

WIP_MOVE_TXN_INTERFACE
WIP_COST_TXN_INTERFACE

Records not processing out of these tables will stop valuable costing
information from WIP transactions.

Material Account Distribution Report should reflect balancing total of

what gets posted to General Ledger.

Understanding Transfer Transactions to GL Page 6

WIP_TRANSACTION_ACCOUNTS

WIP_TRANSACTION_ACCOUNTS stores the accounting information

for each resource transaction in wip_transactions. The process Transfer to
GL picks transactions with a gl_batch_id of –1 from this table and passes
them to gl_interface. When it passes the transactions to the
GL_INTERFACE it is at this time that the batch is given it’s proper batch
number. This is used to overwrite the gl_batch_id and update it.

The transaction_value and base_transaction_value are transferred to the

gl_interface table through period close or GL transfer (INTCGL) process.
Until this process is run, the gl_batch_id is set to -1. Oracle Work in
Process uses the information in this table to track the financial impact of
resource transactions.

ORG_GL_BATCHES

ORG_GL_BATCHES holds history rows for every batch of transactions

that have been interfaced to the gl_interface table. When GL Transfer or
Period Close function is run, a new row is inserted into this table, using
the next gl_batch_id number. This row contains the transfer date and the
acct_period_id from org_acct_periods.

The gl_batch_id column in the accounting transaction tables is updated

with this gl_batch_id, and this id prevents the accounting transaction from
being interfaced twice to the gl_interface table.

Upon launching the GL Transfer function, the gl_batch_id is set to 0,

which represents "Processing" status. The gl_batch_id is set to a positive
number when successfully completed and to a negative number when
failure occurs.

For Oracle Inventory, the accounting table is mtl_transaction_accounts

and for Oracle Work In Process, the accounting table is
wip_transaction_accounts.

ORG_ACCT_PERIODS

ORG_ACCT_PERIODS holds the open and closed financial periods for

organizations.
Transfer to GL program process gets the first acct period id, which is not
closed, from this table.

Understanding Transfer Transactions to GL Page 7

The Transfer to GL program transfers the accounting info from the first
accounting period to the accounting period passed in as input parameter.

MTL_PARAMETERS

This table maintains a set of defaults and controls like general ledger
accounts; locator, lot, and serial controls; inter-organization options;
costing method; etc. for each organization defined in Oracle Inventory.

Transfer to GL process looks at the value of the column

general_ledger_update_code to determine whether summarized or detailed
accounting information is to be transferred for an organization.

Possible column values are:

1. Detail records
2. Summary records
3. ‘No Transfer’

Understanding Transfer Transactions to GL Page 8

TRANSFER TO GL FLOWCHART

Begin

Check flag general_ledger_update_code in mtl_parameters to determine whether

to insert summary record or detail records into GL_INTERFACE table

y Get the gl_batch_id from org_gl_batches_s sequence

y Get the group_id from gl_interface_control_s sequance

Create a batch record in org_gl_batches for the combination of organization_id/

acct_priod_id/gl_date/gl_description with gl_batch_id = 0. This is to indicate that
GL transfer has been initiated and no other parallel gl transfer gets initiated by
another user for the same input parameters

Get the first acct period id which is not closed,from the ORG_ACCT_PERIODS
table for the input acct_period_id passed to GL TRANSFER program

Get the currency information,chart of accounts and set of book information for
inventory organization

Understanding Transfer Transactions to GL Page 9

 A

For each of the accounting period id, get the start date and the end date

y Mark the batch of transactions with gl_batch_id for all the records in the
mtl_transaction_accounts for each acct_period_ids start date and end date

y Mark the batch of transactions with gl_batch_id for all the records in the
wip_transaction_accounts for each acct_period_ids start date and end date

y Insert summary or detail data of inventory activities in GL_INTERFACE table for

the above records in the mtl_transaction_accounts

y Inserting summary or detail data of working in process (wip) in GL_INTERFACE

for the above records in the wip_transaction_accounts

Update gl_batch_id of the batch record in org_gl_batches with the actual value

These records can now be imported to final GL tables using import to GL program

End

Understanding Transfer Transactions to GL Page 10

RUNNING ‘TRANSFER TO GL’ PROCESS

Transfer Transactions to GL process can be run from Oracle Inventory Æ

Accounting Close Cycle Æ General Ledger Transfers.

The log file would provide the Group ID for the transfer. This group Id
can be used to query the records inserted into gl_interface owing to this
transfer. This group_id can then be used as a parameter to import these
records into General Ledger (Nav: Oracle General Ledger > Journals >
Import > Run).

To view the details of the transfer, Navigate to Accounting Close Cycle Æ

View General Ledger Transfers. Query the GL transfers based on
appropriate criteria in the find screen to view the transfer details. This
would give details of the transfer including: Processing Status, Transfer
Date, GL Date, GL Batch, Period. This screen can be used further to drill
down to transaction distributions.

Note the GL Batch Id from the field ‘GL Batch’. This gl_batch_Id can be
used to view the number of records from mtl_transaction_accounts &
wip_transaction_accounts transferred to gl_interface through this transfer.

Understanding Transfer Transactions to GL Page 11

When the ‘Transfer Transactions to GL’ process is run with ‘Transfer to
GL’ as ‘Detail’ and more than one period is open, the accounting
information from the earliest open period up to the Transfer Date is
transferred to GL. In this case, the Accounting Date is the same as the
Transaction Date of the transaction. If the value of Transfer to GL is
‘Summary’ and more than one period is open and the Transfer Date is in
the later period, the transfer process assigns the period end date of the
respective period as the Accounting Date for all the summarized
accounting transactions in that period. For the last period, the process
assigns the Transfer date as the Accounting Date to all the summarized
accounting transactions.

The ability to run the ‘Transfer Transactions to GL’ process anytime

during an open period provides an option to run it regularly before the
Period End. Reconciliation of many issues can be done before the period
ends leading to a smoother period close. This practice, would also quicken
the period close, especially if detailed entries are to be transferred to GL.
This is because transfer of a lot of records would have already occurred
and relatively fewer records would need to be transferred during the
period end.

Even before closing the period, it is suggested, if time permits, to run the
GL Transfer process up to the period end date. This makes it possible to
check the transactions and if necessary make adjustments by means of
new inventory transactions in the same period. This is helpful as it is not
possible to reopen a closed inventory period.

DIAGNOSTICS

Note 206576.1 - Diagnostic Test: Inventory (INV) Period Close Check

Diagnostics

This diagnostic test checks through the entire mandatory and

recommended requirements necessary to allow a successful Inventory
period month end close.

This test should be run prior to month-end close. It will gather and display
information that would prevent a month end close for a given Inventory
period. This enables easy identification of known month end close issues
along with detail information on how to resolve these issues.

The report format can be created in summary or detail.

Error and warning messages, followed by suggested actions, identify

possible problem areas.

Understanding Transfer Transactions to GL Page 12

Note 246467.1 - BDEprdcls.sql - Script for Checking Pending
Transactions

The script is used for identifying any pending or uncosted transactions and
providing pertinent information. The transactions are identified by
organization and period.

Note 246467.1 - CstCheck.sql – Cost Diagnostics Script

TOOLS

Note 102878.1 - Pending Transactions Guide

There are a variety of reasons for pending transactions. This paper will
serve as a guide for troubleshooting and resolving pending transaction
issues, which are preventing you from closing an inventory accounting
period.

CONCLUSION

‘Transfer to GL’ process can be run at any time during an open period as a
concurrent program or as a part of the period end process. When the
process is run with more than one periods open, all the transactions from
the earliest open period to the date up to which the process is run (Transfer
Date) are considered for Transfer to GL. The transfer involves
update/insert on four main tables gl_interface, org_gl_batches,
mtl_transaction_accounts & wip_transaction_accounts. The accounting
data can then be imported into General Ledger using ‘Journal Import’
program.

CREDITS
1. Oracle Inventory User’s Guide
2. Oracle Inventory Technical Reference Manual

Understanding Transfer Transactions to GL Page 13

Understanding Transfer Transactions to GL
June 2004
Author: Vikrant Vartak, Vinay Bellave
Contributing Authors: Joel Flores, Edgar Arroyo

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