Bundles

Bundles allow you to combine multiple items into one sales package. They can be defined in the item master data as well as created on-the-fly in most sales documents. Bundles unfold their full potential for a clear structuring of sales documents in combination with Formatting and Sub-totals, which are also part of DYCE Easy Bundle Seller.

Product Bundle

A bundle is a combination of individual components into a standalone product. It can be used in Sales Quotes and Sales Orders (from here on called sales documents). The price of the bundle is based on the prices of the components. Bundles can be used based on master data or created individually (on-the-fly).

Master data for bundles

To use fixed bundles, they can be created in the master data of the items. This allows easy use e.g. in a sales offer. For this purpose, a new item is created to be used for a product bundle. The description of the bundle is entered in the item's description. The Bundle field (on the Item card in the General fast tab) is set to YES.

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The item representing the bundle must be set as inventory managed (Type=Inventory). This is Business Central's requirement for an assembly bill of materials to be created. However, this is not further relevant to the use of the item, as the item will be converted to a text line when used in a sales document.

Subsequently, the components for the bundle are stored via the Assembly BOM (call via Related / Bill of Materials / Assembly). The moment a Bundle item is used in a sales line and a quantity is entered, the related BOM is automatically unfolded. In this process, the line with the Bundle item is converted to a text line (field Grouping=Bundle), and the entries in the BOM become components. The system also takes into account settings from Sales & Receivables Setup. For more details on how assembly BOMs work, please see this part of the Microsoft documentation.

Service Items as components

Only Service Items whose Service Billing Type is Budget can be used as components of a Bundle. The background to this is that Bundles can only be shipped and invoiced as a whole. Neither is possible with the Service Billing Types Time & Material and Fixed Price.

Creating a custom bundle

In addition to using a predefined bundle (see above), an individual or one-time bundle can also be created manually within a sales process. For this, a line of the type Comment (text line) must be created in the first step. In the text line, the description is entered and the indicator in the Grouping field is changed to Bundle. The Bundle is initially created with quantity 1.
In the following lines the components (items) are entered. These lines are marked as Components in the Grouping field. In the component lines, the quantities are entered that result in exactly one Bundle.
Afterwards, the bundle can be edited in the Bundle page. The page is called up via the function Edit Bundle in the line menu (Manage in the sales document). Here, Unit of Measure as well as Quantity, Discount and the Unit Price of the bundle can be edited. In the sales documents, increasing the quantity in the bundle will correspondingly increase all quantities in the components.

Defaults for custom bundles

To facilitate the creation of a bundle on-the-fly, defaults can be stored via the Bundle Unit of Measure, Bundle Line Format Style and Bundle Print Components fields in the Sales & Receivables Setup page in the Bundle fast tab. These entries are optional. If these fields are not filled, they must be assigned when creating an individual Bundle.

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If you want to quickly go to the page for Bundle, you can get the Bundle Description field via personalization. Clicking on the field will open the Bundle page.

If a sales document contains multiple bundles, a selection window for assigning the component to the desired bundle is displayed when components are entered. The bundle that is next above the component is always suggested (highlighted). By confirming the selection, the component is assigned to the bundle.

Prices and discounts in the Bundle

Unit price, amount and discount amount of a bundle are calculated based on the components. The unit price of a bundle (Unit Price Excl. VAT or bundle price) is calculated by dividing the sum of the amounts and discount amounts of the components by the bundle quantity:

$$Bundle \ price = \frac{1}{Bundle \ quantity} \sum\limits_1^n quantity \ component_i*price \ component_i$$

The line amount of a bundle (Line Amount Excl. VAT or bundle amount) is equal to the sum of the component amounts:

$$Bundle \ amount = \sum\limits_1^n amount \ Component_i$$

The discount of a bundle (Line Discount Amount or bundle discount) is equal to the sum of the discount amounts of the components:

$$Bundle \ discount \ amount = \sum\limits_1^n (discount \ amount \ component_i)$$

If a component is added or removed from a bundle or the price of the component is changed, the bundle's price, amount, and discount are recalculated. If the quantity of a component is changed, the bundle's amount and discount will be recalculated. If a discount is entered, changed or deleted in a component, the amount and discount in the bundle will be recalculated.

Service Commitment Items are not included in the bundle price, amount and discount calculation. Changes in components will immediately result in a change in the bundle. This includes quantity-based component price changes caused by quantity changes in the bundle.

The quantity, price, discount and amount of the bundle can be changed using the Edit Bundle line action. A quantity change in the bundle will change the quantities of the components. Bundle amount and discount will be recalculated. If the quantity of a component is changed, the price is also recalculated, provided that there are entries in a Sales Price list.

In case of a price change in a bundle, the prices of all components are recalculated. In this case, the prices of the components are changed by the same proportion as the bundle price was changed. If after the price change of the components the newly calculated bundle price does not match the manually entered bundle price, the difference is calculated down to one bundle (quantity = 1) and added to the price of one component. For this second step, the optimal component is determined. If a component and the bundle have the same quantity, the component is optimal and used to make up the difference. If there is more than one component with the same quantity, the last one is used. If there is no component with the same quantity, the last component is used.

$$Price \ component_i = Old \ price \ component_i* \frac{New \ Bundle \ price}{Old \ Bundle \ Price}$$
$$Price \ Component_i = Calculated \ Price \ Component_i* \frac{New \ Bundle \ price \ - \ Calculated \ Bundle \ Price}{Bundle \ quantity}$$

Rounding precision

When calculating the bundle price, Unit-Amount Rounding Precision (LCY) from General Ledger Setup is used. Since the number of decimal places, that can be used in Business Central is limited, it is possible, that due to the rounding of the component prices, the manually entered bundle price (and the amount calculated from it) no longer match the totals of the components. In this case, the bundle price is recalculated from the components and applied.

Example (rounded to 5 decimal places)

Grouping	Quantity	Price	Amount
Bundle	2	10.078,-	20.156,-
Component 1	10	125,-	1.250,-
Component 2	12	123,-	1.476,-
Component 3	42	415,-	17.430,-

New bundle price: 10.000,-

Grouping	Quantity	Price	Amount
Bundle	2	10.000,0088	20.000,0176
Component 1	10	124,03255	15504,06875
Component 2	12	122,04803	15011,90769
Component 3	42	411,78847	170892,21505

Using a proportional price change of the components, it is not possible to solve problems of this type. It is possible to calculate matching prices, but the price changes would appear random, which is why we refrain from doing so.

Example for clarification:

Grouping	Quantity	Price	Amount
Bundle	2	10.000,-	20.000,-
Component 1	10	125,-	1.250,-
Component 2	12	124,-	1.488,-
Component 3	42	411,-	17.262,-
The prices solve the problem mathematically, but the price changes of the components do not follow a clear logic.

If a Line Discount % or Line Discount Amount is entered in the bundle, the percentage discount of the bundle is calculated and applied to all components. A discount can be entered among other things by changing the bundle amount. If the discount in the bundle is deleted, all discounts of the components are deleted. Service Commitment Items are taken into account when setting discounts in the bundle. If a discount is entered in a Service Commitment Item, it will not be included in the calculation of the discount of the bundle.

Rounding of price and amount

The number of decimal places to be used can be set up in Business Central (s. rounding precision in General Ledger Setup). If the rounding precision for Unit Price and Amount differ, it is possible to create Bundles in which Unit Price and Amount cannot be calculated in the conventional way. Normally, the Unit Price of a Bundle is calculated as the sum of the Unit Prices of the components and the Amount of a Bundle is calculated as the sum of the Amounts of the components. For example, if Unit Prices use a rounding precision of 5 decimal places and Amounts use a rounding precision of 2 decimal places, Quantity x Unit Price and Amount in the Bundle could differ due to rounding. To prevent Bundle Unit Price x Bundle Quantity from differing from the Bundle Amount, the Bundle Unit Price is calculated from the Bundle Amount and the Bundle Quantity in the event of differences.

$$Bundle \ price = \frac{bundle \ amount}{bundle \ quantity}$$

Example

Grouping	Quantity	Unit Price	Amount
Bundle	1	2.00	2.00
Component 1	1	1.11111	1.11
Component 2	1	0.88888	0.89

The sum of the Unit Prices of the components equals 1.99999.
The sum of the Amounts of the components equals 2.00.
The Bundle line would therefore be printed with Quantity 1, Unit Price 1.99999 and Amount 2.00.
To counteract the inaccuracy caused by rounding, the Bundle Unit Price is calculated from the Bundle Amount. This ensures that Unit Price and Amount of the Bundle match when printed.

This procedure could potentially cause inaccuracies when manually changing Bundle Unit Prices and recalculating component prices. However, no such case is currently known.

Dimensions for bundles

In sales documents, dimensions can be entered directly on the bundle. The behavior of dimensions for bundles in sales documents is controlled in the Sales & Receivables Setup page in the Dimensions fast tab via the Bundle Dimension Priority field.

Shipment of a bundle

Item shipment behaves identically with and without a bundle.

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The quantities of the components cannot be adjusted after the initial shipment. The bundles quantity, on the other hand, can still be adjusted after delivery. The Bundle Qty. Shipped and Bundle Qty. Invoiced fields can be viewed directly in the bundle.

Invoice bundle in sales document

In the Sales Order, the bundle is treated as a standalone product during billing. It can only be billed if it is shipped as a whole. Components in a bundle cannot be billed independently. I.e. only as many bundles can be invoiced as whole bundles were shipped. If a bundle consists of two components and only one is shipped, it is not a complete bundle and therefore cannot be invoiced. If both components are shipped, the bundle can be invoiced. Accordingly, Qty. to Invoice is set in the components so that bundles are always invoiced as a whole.

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If a component is to be explicitly invoiced individually, the bundle can be dissolved at any time. To dissolve the bundle, either the bundle line must be deleted or the Bundle flag must be removed.
The bundle cannot be reassembled after dissolution. New sales lines must be created for the quantities not yet shipped and a new bundle created if necessary.

Bundles in Prepayment Invoices

In Sales Orders, Bundles are treated as standalone products. The same applies to Prepayment Invoices. If one component is assigned to a Payment Plan Step, the whole Bundle with all components is automatically assigned. The bundle line is created with quantity 1 in the Prepayment Invoice. The formatting of the Sales lines, Components and Bundle line are transferred to the Prepayment Invoices.