Description:

Currently, Assembly BOMs only support Inventory Items and Resources as components. Non-Inventory Items cannot be added as BOM components, which creates a gap for businesses that use raw materials or services that are consumed in production without requiring inventory tracking.

Business scenario:

Some businesses use raw materials as components in assembled items where those materials are consumed per unit of measure (e.g. per gram, per litre) and are not inventory-tracked — making Non-Inventory Item the appropriate BC type. The assembled finished goods are Inventory Items with standard Assembly BOMs.

Because Non-Inventory Items cannot be added to Assembly BOMs, businesses are forced to use either Resources or Inventory Items as a workaround. Resources work for BOM costing but do not support cost-plus % pricing in Sales Price Lists, making customer pricing management manual. Inventory Items introduce unwanted inventory tracking overhead for materials that are never stocked.

Proposed solution:

Allow Non-Inventory Items to be selected as Assembly BOM components. Non-Inventory Items already carry a Unit Cost field, so the standard Calculate Standard Cost rollup could include them without significant architectural change. This would allow businesses to accurately cost assembled items while using the appropriate item type for each component, and benefit from standard Sales Price List cost-plus pricing for those components.

Impact:

Affects any business that assembles products from raw materials or services that are expensed rather than stocked.