Hope this might be helpful:
Changing the Item Tracking Code for an item that already has Item Ledger Entries (ILEs) is an extremely complex and generally unsupported direct modification in Business Central, particularly when going from Lot Tracking to No Lot Tracking.
Why it's so complex and risky:
- Data Integrity: Item Tracking (Lot No., Serial No.) is fundamental to how inventory is managed, costed, and traced. Modifying it directly for items with history will corrupt your inventory ledger, costing, and traceability.
- Layered Entries: Item Tracking information is stored not just on the Item Ledger Entry, but also on Value Entries, Reservations, and potentially Bin Contents, Production Order Components, Sales/Purchase Lines, etc. All these related entries rely on the tracking dimension.
- No Standard Feature: Business Central does not offer a standard function to change the Item Tracking Code on an item with existing inventory or posted transactions precisely because of the data integrity risks
What would theoretically need to be modified (and why you shouldn't directly):
If you were to force this change, you'd be looking at modifying data in:
- Item (Table 27): The
Item Tracking Code field itself.
- Item Ledger Entry (Table 32):
Lot No., Serial No., and Item Tracking Code fields on existing entries.
- Value Entry (Table 5802):
Lot No., Serial No. fields.
- Reservation Entry (Table 337):
Lot No., Serial No. fields if any reservations exist.
- Bin Content (Table 7302):
Lot No., Serial No. fields if warehouse management is used.
- And potentially: Production Order Components, Sales Line, Purchase Line, Transfer Line (for any outstanding documents linked to the item).
from Lot Tracking to No Lot Tracking is particularly problematic because you'd be trying to remove a dimension that existing records rely on. This is fundamentally different from changing between two tracking codes (e.g., from one Lot No. code to another, or one Serial No. code to another), which might have slightly less catastrophic but still significant implications.
Recommended (and generally only safe) approach:
The only truly safe and supported way to effectively change the item tracking for an item with history is a phased approach, often requiring a "new item" strategy:
- Zero Out Inventory: Ensure the inventory quantity for the existing item is zero. This means selling, adjusting out, or transferring all quantities.
- Block the Old Item: Once inventory is zero, set the old item to
Blocked to prevent further transactions.
- Create a New Item: Create a new item number with the desired
Item Tracking Code (e.g., "No Lot Tracking").
- Transfer/Adjust: If you must bring in "old" physical inventory under the new tracking, you would effectively adjust out the quantity from the old item (with its lot tracking) and adjust in the same quantity to the new item (without lot tracking). This clearly separates the historical tracking.
- Update Masters: Update any Bill of Materials, production routings, sales agreements, recurring sales/purchase lines, etc., to use the new item number.
Directly modifying table entries to change the Item Tracking Code on an item with existing Item Ledger Entries is highly discouraged and will lead to data corruption. The robust approach involves creating a new item and managing the transition of inventory and future transactions. If you absolutely must try a direct data manipulation, it would require significant customization and data migration expertise from a Microsoft Partner, performed only in a test environment, with full understanding of the extreme risks.
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