Q - In the past, there has been an issue with Elliott locking in the middle of orders and the order showing as incomplete or already in use.  We think the cause for this is a networking issue.  But our user was able to change the incomplete order to complete and proceed from there.

With the latest Elliott update, our user is receiving the following message:

    Order is either incomplete or already in use.  Would you like to continue?

But there's no option to clear unless they login to Elliott as SUPERVISOR. See sample screen below:

What rights can I give the users so they can clear this themselves, so I don't have to log on as SUPERVISOR to clear the situation for the user?    

A - You can set the flag in Password Setup -> Global User Security -> Screen 6 -> “7. Allow User to Change COP Incomplete Order” to “Y.”  See sample screen below: 

Just to clarify, the reason a COP order becomes incomplete is because during order entry, systems need to flag an order as "incomplete" to signal that someone is in the middle of editing, so other users or processes do not touch this order and cause a conflict. In rare situations, during that time, the Elliott user session crashes for some reason. That leaves this order with the "incomplete" status. Many years ago, the only thing a user could do with this incomplete order was to delete it and start over.  Later on, we decided to allow users to make an incomplete order complete.  However, we have noticed a few incidents where the first user is in the middle of editing an order, and a second user uses this feature to edit the same order.  Thus, two users are editing the same order at the same time.  This can be problematic.

For example, we have seen the following scenario a few times: (1) User A brings up order# 1234 and goes to the order line item screen. This makes the order “incomplete”; (2) User B brings up the same order and receives the incomplete message; (3) Instead of making sure there’s no other user currently working on order# 1234, user B selects “Y” to make it complete and to gain access to the line item screen and make changes; (4) Then user B prints a pick ticket, invoices for order# 1234..etc. (5) Finally, User A exits order# 1234, and the order becomes “complete” instead of “invoiced.”  You can imagine what a mess this can cause.

So this flag is introduced to make sure users do not abuse the privilege of making an incomplete order complete. Please only give the admin group of users the privilege to change incomplete orders to complete.  The question is how would an admin user know this order has become incomplete because of Elliott crashing, or due to the fact that someone is in the middle of editing this order? What follows are our suggestions:

1. If you post invoices every night (through Deferred Processing), and if there are any incomplete orders, those incomplete orders will show up on the posting journal in the beginning section. Since it is unlikely that a user will be in the middle of editing an order overnight, it is relatively safe to assume that if the incomplete order shows up on the posting journal, then it is due to Elliott crashing.  You can go ahead make the order complete.
2. The method in number 1 above requires waiting for one day before a crashed Elliott order can be made "complete" again.  If a salesperson comes to you and says the order must be shipped today, then what do you do?  In that case, you should walk around your company to asking users one by one if anyone currently has this order up on their screen. This can work for smaller organizations, but may not work as well for larger companies or companies with multiple locations.
3. The best method is to use Audit Master (if you have it) and check the last change activities for this order to find out who last changed this order to incomplete, and then go to that user to see if that person has the order up on the screen before changing the order to complete.  

EMK