Configuring RFQ and Quotation Properties

Many properties affect how RFQs and Quotations proceed through their lifecycles.

The properties defined in this section let you:


  • Edit attribute groups in the final review state
  • Define the time of day quotations are required on their due date
  • Demote quotations when an RFQ in the Sent stated is changed
  • Allow cancelled RFQs to display in the list of RFQs
  • Define the states in which a Document attached to an RFQ or line item can be revised
  • Allow suppliers to increase the cost for price periods
  • Define daily discount rate for calculating the Net Present Value
  • Set the minimum number of days suppliers have to return a quotation
  • Turn off due date checks
  • Allow precreation of line items for large RFQs
  • Allow suppliers to return quotations after the due date

Skip any of the steps if you do not want to make that change.

Request for Quotes (RFQs) were called Request to Suppliers (RTS) in previous versions and some administrative objects and properties refer to RTS instead of RFQ.

  1. Open the emxSourcing.properties file for editing.

  2. To allow buyers to edit attribute group values in the Final Review state, follow these steps:

    1. Locate this line: 

       emxSourcing.editBuyerPrivateAttributeGroupInFinalReview =
false

      When an attribute group has the Buyer role and the scope is Private (All Line Items or Specific Line Item), the buyer can edit values for those attributes for roles up to the Final Review state. If you want to allow buyers to edit the values for those attributes in the Final Review state, you can use this property.

    2. Set the value for this property depending on your business requirements:


      1. true. The buyer can edit the attribute values (for attribute groups defined as indicated above) in the Final Review state.
      2. false. The buyer cannot edit attribute values in the Final Review state.

  3. To define the quote requested by time (the time of day on the due date that the quotation must be received by), follow these steps:

    1. Locate this line: 

       emxSourcing.DefaultQuoteRequestedByTime = 9:00AM

    2. Set the value for this property depending on your business requirements in number of days. The default value is 9:00AM.

  4. To automatically demote quotations when an RFQ in the Sent state is changed, follow these steps:

    1. Locate this line: 

       emxSourcing.RTSQuotationOptionalDemote = true

    2. Set the value for this property depending on your business requirements:


      1. true. ENOVIA Sourcing Central demotes quotations from the Review or Returned states to the Open state when an RFQ is edited. The supplier can then edit the quotation based on the RFQ changes.
      2. false. ENOVIA Sourcing Centraldoes not demote the quotation; it remains in its current state.

      The supplier is notified of changes to the RFQ even if the quotation is not demoted.

    3. To configure this feature for a specific supplier company, create a new property in the emxSourcing.properties file:

      The supplier company must be defined to use a dedicated vault. This feature applies to all companies assigned to that vault.

      emxSourcing.RTSQuotationOptionalDemote.VAULTNAME = true

      Replace VAULTNAME with the vault's name, and replace any spaces in the name with an underscore character. For example "Acme Inc" would be "Acme_Inc".

  5. To configure whether cancelled RFQs show in the RFQ list, follow these steps:

    1. Locate this line: 

      emxSourcing.ShowCancelledRFQsinDesktopList=true

    2. Set the value for this property depending on your business requirements:


      1. true. Cancelled RFQs show in the list of RFQs for a buyer.
      2. false. Cancelled RFQs do not show in the list of RFQs.

    3. To configure this feature for a specific vault, create a new property in the emxSourcing.properties file: 

      emxSourcing.ShowCancelledRFQsinDesktopList.VAULTNAME = true

      This property affects all companies in that vault. Replace VAULTNAME with the vault's name, and replace any spaces in the name with an underscore character. For example "Acme Inc" would be "Acme_Inc".

  6. To define the states in which a document attached to an RFQ or line item can be edited or revised, follow these steps:

    1. Locate this line: 

       emxSourcing.DocumentRevisionableStatesforRFQ = state_Started,state_PackageSent

      When an RFQ is promoted to a state, the value of the RFQ's Suspend Versioning attribute (a hidden attribute) is updated based on this property.

    2. Set the value for this property depending on your business requirements by adding or removing the symbolic name for any state in the RFQ or Package policy.

  7. To allow suppliers to increase costs over price periods, follow these steps:

    1. Locate this line: 

       emxSourcing.AllowPriceHikeForPricePeriods = No

    2. Set the value for this property depending on your business requirements:


      1. No. Suppliers can only decrease costs for subsequent price periods.
      2. Yes. Suppliers can increase or decrease costs for subsequent price periods

      ENOVIA Sourcing Central never allows more than a 100% increase or decrease and nver allows a 0% price period change.

  8. To define the daily discount rate for calculating Net Present Values (NPV) for price period prices, follow these steps:

    1. Locate this line: 

      emxSourcing.DailyDiscountRate = 0.1

      This value is a percentage. This default rate is used if there is no company-specific discount rate defined for the buyer's company. ENOVIA Sourcing Central calculates NPV using this formula:

      NPV = Unit Cost / (1 + R) D

      where:


      • Unit Cost is the base unit cost or the price of the first price period.
      • R is the discount rate per day
      • D is the number of days from the base effective date for the line item to the effective date of the price period.

    2. Set the value for this property depending on your business requirements.
    3. To configure this feature for a specific vault, create a new property in the emxSourcing.properties file: 

      emxSourcing.DailyDiscountRate.VAULTNAME = 0.1

      This property affects all companies in that vault. Replace VAULTNAME with the vault's name, and replace any spaces in the name with an underscore character. For example "Acme Inc" would be "Acme_Inc".

  9. To set the minimum days for suppliers to return quotations, follow these steps:

    1. Locate this line: 

       emxSourcing.TimeHorizonValue = 30

    2. Set the value for this property depending on your business requirements. Enter the number of minimum days a supplier has to complete and return the quotation.
    3. To configure this feature for a specific vault, create a new property in the emxSourcing.properties file:

      emxSourcing.TimeHorizonValue.VAULTNAME = 30

      This property affects all companies in that vault. Replace VAULTNAME with the vault's name, and replace any spaces in the name with an underscore character. For example "Acme Inc" would be "Acme_Inc".

  10. To disable due date checks (checking that the buyer has permitted the supplier sufficient time to respond to the quotation), follow these steps:

    1. Locate this line: 

      emxSourcing.PerformDueDateCheck=true

      This property controls date checks when the RFQ is created or edited. To turn off due date checks when an RFQ is promoted to Initial Review or Sent, see step 12.

    2. Set the value for this property depending on your business requirements:


      1. true. ENOVIA Sourcing Central checks that the set due date is not less than the value of the TimeHorizonValue property.
      2. false. No check is done; the buyer can enter any value for the due date.

  11. To enable precreation of line items for large RFQs, follow these steps:

    1. Locate this line: 

       emxSourcing.PreCreateSupplierLineItemAttributeGroups=false

      By default, Expected Line Item Count and Expected Supplier Count are hidden attributes of RFQs. To improve performace when creating very large RFQs, these attributes can be shown and users can enter values for them.

    2. Set the value for this property depending on your business requirements:


      • true. ENOVIA Sourcing Central precreates line items that are later updated, thereby improving performance. The user sees two new fields on the RFQ:
        • Expected Line Item Count
        • Expected Supplier Count.
      • false. These attributes do not show on the RFQ.

  12. To allow suppliers to return quotations after the due date, follow these steps:

    1. Locate this line: 

      emxSourcing.IgnoreResponseDueDate = false

    2. Set the value for this property depending on your business requirements:


      • true. After the quotation's due date has passed, the supplier can still return the quotation.
      • false. Once the due date has passed, the quotation cannot be returned.

      What happens to an unreturned quotation after the due date passes depends on the value of the RTSResponseCompletedProcess property. See Handling Late Quotations.

  13. If needed, continue editing the emxSourcing.properties file. If finished, save the file.

  14. When finished making all properties file edits, restart the application server. If using a J2EE implementation, run the warutil and deploy files as usual.