How SPS Commerce EDI works
Retailers that trade over EDI don't email you orders or read your invoices. They send and expect a fixed set of electronic documents, each known by a three-digit code. SPS Commerce carries those documents between you and every retailer you trade with, and SKU.io reads and writes them for you, so the exchange runs alongside your ordinary order handling.
The documents
| Code | Document | Direction | What it says |
|---|---|---|---|
| 850 | Purchase order | Retailer → you | What the retailer wants, at what price, shipped where and by when |
| 855 | Acknowledgment | You → retailer | That you accepted the order |
| 856 | Ship notice | You → retailer | What shipped, in which cartons, with which carrier and tracking |
| 810 | Invoice | You → retailer | What you're billing for the shipment |
| 846 | Inventory advice | You → retailer | How many of each item you have available to sell them |
Each document carries the retailer's trading partner ID (its address on the SPS Commerce network) and, apart from inventory advice, the purchase order number it belongs to.
How an order flows
- A purchase order arrives. SKU.io checks SPS Commerce every five minutes, or when you click Check SPS for new orders. When every line matches one of your products, it creates the sales order straight away. When a line doesn't, the purchase order waits for you to map the item.
- The acknowledgment goes back. As soon as the sales order exists, SKU.io sends the retailer an acknowledgment.
- You ship. You fulfill the sales order the way you fulfill any other order.
- The ship notice goes back. How it's built depends on the connection:
- Item-level (the default): the ship notice lists what shipped and goes as soon as you record the shipment.
- Carton-level: the ship notice lists every carton, with its SSCC-18 number, so it waits until you pack the shipment's cartons and finalize the packing. Retailers that receive by scanning carton labels require this.
- The invoice goes back. When invoices are turned on, SKU.io sends one invoice per shipment right after its ship notice.
When inventory advice is turned on, SKU.io sends every retailer a daily count of the items it orders from you.
What runs on its own, and what you do
| On its own | Your part |
|---|---|
| Checking SPS Commerce for purchase orders, every five minutes | Map an item the first time a retailer orders it, if SKU.io can't match it to a product |
| Creating the sales order and sending the acknowledgment | Fulfill the sales order |
| Sending the ship notice when the shipment is recorded (item-level) | Pack and finalize the cartons, and print their labels (carton-level) |
| Sending the invoice after the ship notice | Choose which documents the connection sends, once |
| Sending inventory advice once a day | Resend a document if SPS Commerce rejected it |
Every document received and sent is listed on the connection's Documents tab, so you can confirm what went out and resend anything that failed.
Sandbox and production connections
A connection shows Sandbox or Production next to its name. Documents sent from a sandbox connection go to SPS Commerce's test environment and never reach a real retailer, so you can try the whole flow before you go live.