Tradecloud users have to comply to the following business logic to make the platform work and achieve maximum effectivity.

Orders

  1. Item codes
    Buyer and supplier have to align item codes and units of measurement for orders to be exchanged automatically.
  2. Missing item codes
    Describe the proces when the Buyer sends an order with no Supplier Item Code.
  3. New items
    New items have to be aligned on both sides before they can be ordered. The Tradecloud Item Management module can be used for this.
  4. Prices
    Price unit quanity. Tradecloud support differences in price unit quantities. (ordered by 1, confrimed price per 100). If this is needed the field has to be used.
  5. Price formats
    Price formats and rounding, are agreed prices in the same format before and after the ‘.’ ? (1.23 Euro)
  6. Order acceptance
    Buyer and supplier have to agree that an order is only final after both parties have agreed on the confirmation. (in case of differences in date/quantity/price)
  7. BOM and routing
    Bill of materials (BOM). Tradecloud will only send the item number from the buyer, so transferring this into a BOM must be done in the ERP system of the supplier
  8. Drawings, revisions and specifications
    How are specifications and revisions communicated? Tradecloud has a module for automatic uploading and linking of CAD drawings.
  9. Packing instructions
    How are packing instructions communicated?
  10. Order line splitting
    The splitting of order lines by the supplier is default off. This means that the buyer has to split the order line if multiple delivery lines need to be created.
  11. Order confirmations
    Suppliers need to confirm the requested date, quantity and price in a separate message. 100% confirmations will be automatically updated in the ERP of the Buyer. Exceptions will be handled in the workflow of the Buyer.
  12. Updates of existing orders
    The buyer may update an existing order. Can the supplier handle this?
  13. Urgent orders
    There is no technical solution for urgent orders. Buyer and supplier have to agree on a separate process for this.
  14. Multiple legal entities?
    Tradecloud standard supports connecting 1 supplier to 1 buyer. Please inform us if you have more entities or you want to receive orders from multiple legal entities / customers.
  15. Final check
    What other actions are sales persons performing manually now that should be automated?

Please make sure that all these topics are discussed and agreed upon before start of the technical implementation.

Technical specifications

  • Messages to exchanged:
    • Purchase Orders from the Customer, via Tradecloud, to Supplier
    • Order Confirmations from Supplier, via Tradecloud, to the Customer
    • Updates of orders by the buyer (e.g. changed date), can they be handled in the ERP system? (standard off for EDI messages)
  • If an FTP server is needed, the Tradecloud SFTP server will be used
  • The interface to the platform is based on the available fields in the latest available version as described on https://test.tradecloud.nl/api/v1/docs
  • The end-customer is responsible for which messages they decide to send or receive via Tradecloud and the data they provide or require

Conditions for success

  • Process alignment needs to be done upfront with regards to Tenant IDs, EDI party information, article numbers, code mappings, etcetera
  • This checklist will be completed after commercial agreement (official start). For each client very minor changes can be made to facilitate better communciation.
  • After acceptance, changes in scope and planning are not allowed before go-live. These will be considered only as a new version of the integration or additional work
  • Each integration will be released, tested and put in acceptance environment one by one
  • Tradecloud will coordinate & perform the end to end test with the client. The integration consultant will be stand-by during the date of the end to end test