Setup Considerations: Gapless Sequencing

You can use this topic to help make decisions when planning your configuration and use of gapless sequence numbers on invoices. It explains:

Why to set it up.

How it fits into the rest of Workday.

Downstream impacts and cross-product interactions.

Security requirements and business process configurations.

Questions and limitations to consider before implementation.

Refer to detailed task instructions for full configuration details.

What It Is

Gapless sequencing enables you to create and assign sequential gapless invoice numbers in 1 or more ledger year or ledger period for a company. This number displays in place of the standard invoice number on both customer and supplier invoices. You can sequence the numbers by:

Approval date of a customer invoice.

Posting date of a supplier invoice.

Accounting date.

When you enable the functionality, Workday creates a sequence generator. You can configure the sequence generator to:

Reset every ledger period, ledger year, or calendar year to match with the posting period of a given invoice type.

Define the sequence pattern of the invoice numbers.

Business Benefits

Using gapless sequencing:

Increases visibility of your transaction details and reduces auditing concerns.

Helps you comply with local tax authority reporting requirements.

Enables you to meet the statutory invoicing requirements.

Use Cases

Your company bills in a country that requires a gapless sequence number on invoices.

When there’s an audit of your company, auditors can select a random invoice number to test and not find that number, causing concerns. They would then require additional evidence to prove that the invoice really doesn't exist.

Questions to Consider

Questions	Considerations
When do you want to start assigning gapless numbers to your invoices?	Workday creates gapless sequence generators after the start of a new period or a fiscal year when no sequence generators exist for a company. This applies to both primary and alternate fiscal years when enabling gapless sequencing. To create a gapless sequence generator for an alternate fiscal schedule, the start date for the alternate schedule must match the start date of a primary ledger period. The duration of an alternate fiscal year must be covered by corresponding primary fiscal years.
When can you change the rule configuration or the sequence generator lifespan?	Changes only apply to: New sequence generators in the next open period. Unused generators in the existing open period.
Do you want to continue using auto-application rules with remittance advice type?	You can continue to use the auto-application rules. The remittance advice type has the option to reference a Gapless Invoice Number , if it exists.
Do you need to enforce any date restrictions on customer invoices?	Workday assigns the gapless invoice number to customer invoices upon invoice approval. Invoices can be out of order based on if you’re using invoice dates or accounting dates in arrears. If you want the gapless sequence to be chronological by either of these dates, use custom validations to restrict the dates to the current day.

Recommendations

You can't change the sequence generators once they are in use. Verify the pattern in your sandbox first to ensure that the sequence numbers are as per your expectations.

When you want to sequence each invoice document type together, use the same sequence generator rule. To have a separate sequence for each invoice document, create different rules.

To avoid creating gaps, don't reopen a closed period when you want to apply the gapless document number to newly approved supplier invoices and adjustments. When the accounting date is before the accounting date of the last document, the sequence can have a gap.

To avoid confusion, give your gapless invoice numbers a different format than the existing invoice numbers. You can use your company and country-specific sequencing rules to determine the pattern of gapless numbers.

To meet local statutory reporting requirements for operational transactions, you can configure your companies to allow accounting by the customer invoice approval date.

Requirements

To create gapless sequence generators, enable the functionality for a desired company.

Specify the gapless sequencing start period to determine when Workday will start creating generators.

To have a gapless number, the customer invoices must be in approved status. However, for supplier invoices, you must close the period.

Configure or select a sequence generator rule for each invoice, credit adjustment, debit adjustment, and credit-rebill. Workday assigns the gapless invoice number based on these rules.

To include the gapless invoice number on an invoice, update your custom BIRT layout because it's a separate attribute from the standard invoice number.

Limitations

After Workday assigns a gapless sequence number to an invoice, you can't cancel or change that invoice anymore. Instead, use invoice adjustments to make modifications.

When you change an existing configuration rule, the updates apply to only new sequence generators.

You can edit or replace the sequence generators only if they aren't in use.

Once you've created the first invoice using gapless sequencing for an alternate fiscal schedule, you can't revert to using gapless sequencing for the primary fiscal schedule.

Tenant Setup

No impact.

Security

Configure these security domains for gapless sequencing:

Domain	Considerations
Set up: Company General domain in the Common Financial Management functional area.	Users secured to this domain can enable the gapless sequence functionality and configure sequence generator rules.
Set Up: Tax domain in the Common Financial Management functional area.	Users secured to this domain can configure gapless sequence generator rules on approved customer or supplier invoices by statutory invoice type.
Public Reporting Items domain.	Users secured to this domain can create custom reports to display the invoice number or gapless document number.

Business Processes

To configure a chronological gapless sequence number on customer invoices when the invoice document date isn’t the current date, you can add custom validations in your business process rule conditions.

Reporting

If the gapless number exists in a given period, you can use all the existing standard reports to track invoices with a gapless document number for a company.

You can use the

Invoice date is in Closed Period

custom report field on the Customer Invoice Document
business object in your custom validations to configure chronological gapless sequence number on customer invoices.

Integrations

You can use these web services for gapless sequencing:

Web Service	Considerations
Get Company ID Definitions Put Company ID Definitions	Retrieves the required IDs to let you enable gapless sequencing for a company.
Get Customer Invoices Get Customer Invoice Adjustments	Update your EIB templates for these web services to support gapless invoice numbers.
Import Customer Invoice	Enables you to add or update customer invoices with gapless sequence number.
Submit Customer Invoice Submit Customer Invoice Adjustment	Enables you to create customer invoices and adjustments with gapless sequence number.

When you enable this functionality, update your integration templates to use the gapless invoice number instead of the standard invoice number.

Connections and Touchpoints

When you enable the gapless sequencing for a company, it extends to all invoices and adjustments originating from awards, billing schedules, and billable projects.

Workday offers a Touchpoints Kit with resources to help you understand configuration relationships in your tenant. Learn more about the Workday Touchpoints Kit on Workday Community.