EPR – Electronic Purchasing Request
EPR – Electronic Purchasing Request enables the optimisation of selected company logistics processes through automation (paperless document processing), standardisation (unified workflow and method), and centralisation (a single system accessible from multiple locations).
Solution Description
EPR – Electronic Purchasing Request is an application that electronically handles purchase requisitions from their creation to the moment an order request is issued. An authorised user can create an electronic requisition, which then moves through an approval workflow to designated approvers. After the final approval, an order request is automatically created in the SAP system. Applicants are continuously informed about the status of their request throughout the entire purchasing process.
EPR Technical Architecture
The application communicates directly with SAP. The user-facing interface is implemented as a web application, accessed through a standard web browser. The administration interface is available through the SAP GUI client. As a web-based application, EPR maintains the advantages of easy accessibility and simplified maintenance.
User Roles and Permissions
The application distinguishes three levels of authorisation:
- Applicant – can create, edit, and search for purchase requisitions.
- Approver – can approve, reject, modify, and search electronic requests.
- Administrator – has unrestricted system access.
All changes made to electronic requests are recorded in the system.
Approvers can display requests pending approval. In the summary list, they can approve, reject, or view attachments. Key request details – such as creation date, applicant name, and total value – are immediately visible. Request details can be adjusted or supplemented, with all changes logged in the history.
Solution Benefits
- Ensures the smooth flow of approval processes according to company requirements
- Clear design, simple operation, concise messages and alerts
- “Intelligent” behaviour (displaying options based on progress or authorisation)
- Direct, real‑time integration with the SAP system (minimising errors and eliminating offline data transfers)
- Automatic creation of order requests in the MM module after the approval process, with dynamic approver assignment based on HR module structures and EPR approval scenarios
- Option to send approval requests with warnings (system prompts users to complete missing data in the form or in SAP) and monitoring of form processing, including full change history
- User activity monitoring (access, request modifications, approval process)
- Ability to modify requests during the approval workflow
- Data access restrictions using authorisation objects (material groups, plants, storage locations, etc.)
- Searching and immediate validation against current SAP ERP data (plants, warehouses, purchased materials, cost centres, purchasing groups, material properties, and subject‑matter details)
- Ability to view current stock levels of requested materials
- Additional checks ensuring data integrity and consistency (reporting, searching, filtering, sorting)
- Convenient system administration (user management, deputy assignments, application customisation, error request handling, etc.)
- Ability to add attachments (Word, Excel, PDF, TXT, etc.)