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What is e-commerce?
Here is a quick guide. We will take you through the various stages of the e-commerce ordering process in a typical B2B communication.
E-orders
In simple terms,e-orders mean that the buyer receives and sends standardized electronic business messages via their business system. Examples include price catalogs, orders, order responses, shipping notifications and invoices. E-commerce generates electronic documentation that is traceable and searchable.
Price catalog
The price catalog is the contract between the supplier and the buyer and the list of products that the buyer wants to buy. In the contract, the products are registered in detail with, for example, item numbers and price information. The price catalog is downloaded by the buyer into his or her ordering system where it is combined with perhaps 100s of similar catalogs from other suppliers.
Order & order response
If a catalog is used, it is also the one that the buyer uses as a starting point when sending his or herorder to the supplier. In the placed order, the buyer includes the necessary information. For example, the item number and quantity and perhaps the desired delivery date. If the buyer has given their permission, items can also be replaced if they are out of stock.
The order is in turn responded to by anorder response that serves as confirmation. The supplier confirms that the order has been received and accepted, that the total price corresponds to the information in the catalog, that the products are in stock and whether any desired delivery date can be met.
Despatch advice
The despatch advice is the next link in the chain. The notification is similar to the order response, except that it is more detailed. It supplements previous information with more precise information. This may include the time of shipment, the carrier used and the search code for tracking information. The despatch advice corresponds to the delivery note, which is increasingly rationalized thanks to electronic communication.
Invoicing and certification
Invoicing is simple as it can usually be created from the information in orders and order responses. Moreover, if the invoice matches the order, there is not always a need for an approval process with the buyer, as the approval is in practice already done when the order is placed.
Significant for e-commerce, and specifically e-orders, is its complex structure. One order can often generate several order responses. A common reason is that ordered products are not in stock but have to be backordered. Same with shipping notifications. Like order responses, the number increases rapidly if the delivery is split into batches as products become available and are distributed.
In general, e-orders have a longer history than e-invoices. Over the years, specific needs have been established along the way. This is illustrated by the unsystematic use of invoice fields over the years. When there was no field for a particular need, other fields in the invoice that were actually intended for other purposes were used.
The widespread disorder in the invoice structure was the basic reason for the introduction of Svefaktura 1.0, which was established in 2004 as the recommended standard for simple e-invoices.
