SAP CRM and Enterprise Business Process Re-Engineering - Implementing SAP CRM - page 217

◾ Client : The highest organizational level in SAP, not to be confused with a customer or client
as defined in SAP Basis environment.
◾ Company Code : The lowest legal entity for external reporting purposes of balance sheet,
P/L statement, etc. There can be multiple company codes for a Client but not the other way
around.
◾ Chart of Accounts : This is useful for legal reporting. Every client has only one chart of
account; all company codes within one client must use only this chart of account.
◾ Credit Control Area : This is useful for credit control management and reporting.
◾ Business Areas : It is useful for flexible financial reporting.
◾ Controlling Area : The highest entity for internal reporting and accounting purposes. A con-
trolling area can have multiple company codes.
◾ Operating Concern : There is only one operating concern for each controlling area. It is used
if the profitability analysis module is implemented (this module may not be implemented by
all customers). Controlling area is assigned to an operating concern.
◾ Valuation Area
◾ Plant : A unit where inventories are stored, accounted, processed, or manufactured. There
can be multiple plants for a company code as well as a purchasing organization.
◾ Sales Organization : The highest level for managing and reporting sales.
◾ Sales Distribution Channel : This characterizes different modes of supplying to end custom-
ers (retail sales, distribution agents, factory outlets, Internet sales, and so on). There can be
multiple distribution channels for a sales organization.
◾ Sales Division : This is useful for management and reporting of a group of products. There
can be multiple product divisions for multiple sales organization as well as a distribution
channels.
◾ Sales Area : It is useful for flexible management and reporting. It is a combination of a sales
organization, distribution channel, and division.
◾ Purchasing Organization : This is an organizational unit for purchasing activities and genera-
tion of purchase orders.
◾ Storage Locations : The physical location where a company's inventory is stored. There can be
multiple storage locations for multiple plants.
◾ General Ledger ( G / L ) Account : G/L accounts are used for legal, external reporting through
the chart of accounts.
◾ Housing Bank and Bank Account : These organization structures reflect a company's banking
institutions and their individual bank accounts.
◾ Vendor Master : This contains important information on the company's vendors. For exam-
ple, a vendor's name, address, telephone number, fax number, contact person, purchasing
information, bank information, and accounting information are stored in the vendor master
data. This information saves on transaction entries; when a transaction is made with the
vendor, the vendor master data can automatically be used by default in the transaction.
◾ Customer Master : Similar to the vendor master data, the customer data contain important
information on the company's customers. Information such as customer's name address,
buying habits, marketing information, and accounting information are stored here. When
a transaction is made with a customer, the customer master data can automatically be used
by default in the transaction.
As may have been noted, some of the IMG transactions actually correspond to the programs
for creation of master data like General Ledger Account, Vendor master data, and Customer