High Level Assembler issues return codes for use with the IF job control statement and the COND parameter of the JOB and EXEC job control language statements. The IF statement and the COND parameter enable you to skip or to run a job step, depending on the results (indicated by the return code) of a previous job step. It is explained in the applicable JCL Reference.

The return code issued by the assembler is the highest severity code that is associated with any error detected in the assembly or with any MNOTE message produced by the source program or macro instructions. The return code can be controlled by the FLAG(n) assembler option described in FLAG. See High Level Assembler messages for a listing of the assembler errors and their severity codes.