As a component of SAP Financial Supply Chain Management (FSCM), SAP

Dispute Management is used to process receivables-related dispute cases. If

a business partner arbitrarily reduces agreed payments, companies must
follow up and clarify the case. Possible reasons for the reduced amount
could be damaged goods or outdated prices that were mistakenly still stored
in the system. Without the right software support, such follow-ups are time-
consuming and involve long processing times, since several employees from
different departments have to coordinate their efforts and also have to
exchange information with the customer. This means that the capacities of
the employees dealing with the dispute case are not available for other tasks.

For such scenarios, SAP Dispute Management offers an efficient solution

approach by creating, structuring and coordinating dispute cases in the SAP
S/4HANA system. Each dispute case is assigned its own case ID, and all
transactions and all relevant information for dispute case processing are
documented under this case ID so that they can still be traced at a later date.
With SAP Dispute Management, the accounts receivable department has an
overview at all times of which dispute cases are still open, what the
respective status of the dispute is, and what outstanding amounts are
involved. Integration with the SAP S/4HANA application SAP FI (Financial
Accounting) ensures that the open item is cleared directly and the dispute
case is automatically set to “Closed” as soon as the outstanding payment is
received.

Process flow and responsibilities for a

dispute case
Typically, the process for a dispute case is as follows: An open item arises
because a customer owes the company money for a product or service.
When payment is received, an underpayment is identified and a residual
item is created for the outstanding amount. SAP Dispute Management now
creates a dispute case because there is a difference between the original
receivable and the settled amount. The dispute case can be closed either by
a settlement payment from the customer or by a credit memo, so that the
residual item is settled.

When creating the dispute case, SAP Dispute Management offers the
possibility to define a processor, a responsible person and a coordinator. The
processor is responsible for coordinating and documenting the dispute case
and the further procedure with the customer. This task can be performed,
for example, by a sales employee who is in contact with the customer
anyway.