psuedo bill of material

A bill of material created for use in production planning that permits various components to be grouped together to simplify administration. This is especially useful if a company's finished products represent many possible permutations that can be created from the various parts kept in stock. A placeholder part number may be created to represent a cluster of components that is common to all the finished products. For example, if all the permutations of a given product use the same base, screws, brackets, and wires, these would all be represented by a single part number on the bill of material. Also called phantom bill of material or planning bill of material.