Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 R3: Important Inventory Status Enhancement for Manufacturers, Part 1

The inventory status is a new dimension that comes with WMS, advanced warehousing, in AX 2012 R3. This is great news for manufacturers that deal with a lot of inspection, rework and Return-To- Vendor scenarios. It is even better news for manufacturers that do remanufacturing, refurbishment or overhaul.  An excellent starting point for our topic is Chapter 4 of the Warehouse Management book for AX 2012 R3 by Scott Hamilton, as well as his earlier article on the topic. From this book, we learn the following basic facts:

1. Basic facts of the new inventory status field

An item only gets an inventory status dimension when it is set up as a WMS item, which means we have a Storage dimension group that would look like this:

As soon as I click "use warehouse management process" in this screen, I will get the active dimensions Location, Inventory Status and License plate" and none of them can be un-checked! (sorry for those of you who had the audacious, but misguided idea to use Advanced warehousing without locations!)

Here is something that may come as a revelation to some: I can use this item in regular warehouses! In that case the license plate dimension is not active but my inventory status is available! This is critical news for manufacturing companies that are project- based and do not really need the WMS functionality. But they probably want to use that inventory status. The scenarios described below all work ...