Orders Login
Contents |
This document describes how orders, specifically sales orders are created, modified, handled, and administered for each project on the TOTECS platform.
Prerequisites
Links
Overview
For every project deployed onto the TOTECS platform there is the ability for non administrator users to create new orders. An order is a request by a person or organisation to purchase goods and services off the organisation associated with the TOTECS project. Each order consists of the following pieces of data:
| Order Data | Description |
|---|---|
| Order ID: | The order ID is a unique identifier for each order created within a TOTECS platform. It allows the order to be located, and used as a reference. For new TOTECS projects this ID starts at the number 1 and increments up. |
| Customer Account ID: | The ID of the customer account. The account denotes the person or organisation that the order is being placed against. In business systems it is critical that orders are placed against accounts. A customer account is also known as a debtor, customer card, business partner, customer in various systems. |
| User Login ID: | The Login ID of the TOTECS project user. This advises of the user who created the order within the TOTECS project. |
| Currency Code: | The currency code sets the currency that is used to price all of the products, and surcharges in the order. |
| Sales Representative ID: | ID of the sales representative who is assigned to the order. The sales representative ID allows the employee or person associated with the order to be recorded against it. Sometimes a customer account will automatically have a sales representative assigned to it, which carries through when an order is submitted. |
| Reviewing User ID: | The user ID of the TOTECS user who was assigned to review the order. This gets set if a user assigned to a customer account requests for another user assigned to the same account to review the order. |
| Status: |
The status of the order denotes how far along an order is in the ordering process. The status can be set to one of the following:
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| Payment Status: | The payment status denotes if an order has been paid for, or not. The status can be one of the following:
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| Payment Method: |
The payment method denotes how the order is being paid for. The payment method can be one of the following:
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| Payment Receipt: | If the order is paid by a credit card or Paypal then this field stores the returned receipt number generated by the payment. The allows users to reference the order to the payment made against it. |
| Purchase Order Number: | A number generated by the user creating the order, that allows it to be linked back to a purchase order that was created in their business system. The purchase order number field could be also used by the user to store any additional information about the order. |
| Delivery Address: | The address that products within the order will be shipped to. |
| Billing Address: | The address of the person or organisation who is paying for the order. |
| Email: | Email address that an notification can be sent to once the order has been successfully submitted. |
| Instructions: | Any additional information that the user wishes to add to the order to allow people processing the order to read. |
| Carrier: | The freight carrier who will be shipping the products in the order. This field is sometimes used in different ways to obtain additional information about the user, or a choice on how they want the order handled. |
| Is Dropship: | Denotes if the order will be shipped to a person or organisation who is not being billed for the order. |
| Location ID: | Sets the geographic location for where the order will be handled, or its products will be shipped from. Typically this is set as a warehouse. |
| Created Date: | Date that the order was first created in the TOTECS project. |
| Processed Date: | Date that the order was submitted and sent off to an external business system for processing. |
| Product Lines: | A list of products, quantities, and prices that appear as rows in the order. |
| Order Total: | The total amount that the order is priced at. |
Billing and Delivery Addresses
For both the Billing and Delivery Address the follow data can be stored:
| Order Data | Description |
|---|---|
| Contact: | Name of the person to contact in regards to the delivery or billing of the order. |
| Address 1: | First address field. Typically stores the street number, and street name. |
| Address 2: | Second address field. Typically stores the suburb, city, or town. |
| Address 3: | Third address field. Typically stores the state, province, or region. |
| Postcode: | Stores the post or zip code. |
| Country: | Stores the country name. |
| Phone: | Stores the contact phone number. |
| Fax: | Stores the contact fax number. |
Product Data
Each each of the product lines contains the following data:
| Order Data | Description |
|---|---|
| Product Code: | Code that identifies the product. |
| Product Name: | Label of the product. |
| Product Description: | Description of the product. One of the 4 product description fields can be configured to display in the order. |
| Unit: | Label to denote how the a single quantity of the product is defined. |
| Quantity: | Amount of stock that has been ordered for the product. |
| Unit Price Excluding Tax: | Price of a single unit of the product excluding taxes. |
| Unit Price Including Tax: | Price of a single unit of the product including taxes. |
| Unit Tax: | Amount of tax applied to a single unit of the product. |
| Taxcode: | Label of type of tax applied to the product. |
| Total Price Excluding Tax: | Sum of the product price excluding tax for all the quantities ordered. |
| Total Price Including Tax: | Sum of the product price including tax for all the quantities ordered. |
| Total Tax: | Amount of tax applied to all the quantities of the product. |
| Weight: | Weight of the product. |
| Volume: | Volume of the product calculated on the height, width, and depth. |
| Attributes: | List of questions and answers that the user has set through the use of the Basket Product Fields when adding a product to basket. |
| Location ID: | Identifier of the location where the product is to be delivered from. |
Order Status
In the State Transition Diagram below view the different states that an order's status can be. An order begins with its Status being set to UNCONFIRMED when it is first created after the user has set the details against the order.
Once the user has paid for (or the order does not require payment) and submitted the order, if the order needs to be approved by a managing user (or a reviewing user) then the order status is set to PENDING. If a pending order is approved by a managing/reviewing user, or the order did not need to be approved then its status is set to UNPROCESSED. Once an order has been successfully sent to the Connector application, then its status will be updated to SENT. Administrator users can also update the UNPROCESSED order to SENT through the Administration Centre's Orders interface.
Order Creation
Orders can be created by users either through the Trade interface or from the content managed websites.
Trade Interface Order Creation
In order for users to create an order through the Trade interface the following steps need to occur:
- The user adds products to their basket.
- From the My Basket page the user clicks on the Next button to navigate to the Order Details page.
- On the Order Details page the user sets the details of the order.
- The user clicks on the Next button in the Order Details page. The platform will validate the given details, calculate any surcharges that are applicable to the user, then create an order with the contents of the products that are in the basket. The order's status is set to unconfirmed at this stage and the user is redirected to the Order Confirmation page.
- On the Order Confirmation page the user reviews the final details of the order and agrees to terms and conditions on submitting the order.
- The clicks on the Submit button, enters any credit card or paypal payment infromation if required, then the order is submitted. Upon successful submission an Email notification is sent to a configured Email address as configured in the project. An Email is optionally sent out to the user who submitted the order if they requested it to. The Email message contains a summary of the order, and an attachment contains the details of the order. The status of the order is updated to either unprocessed, or sent based on if the order could be sent to the connector software that is handling importing the order into its configured business system.
- The user is redirected to the order confirmation screen that shows the updated status of the order.
If the user wished to have the order reviewed by another user, or is forced to because they are assigned to a managing purchase user, then the orders status will be set as Pending. Pending orders must be approved before they can be submitted and have the status changed to unprocessed or sent.
Content Managed Websites Order Creation
In order for users to create orders through a content managed web site the user must follow these stops:
- The user adds products to their basket.
- On a web page containing a Basket Products Listing area they to click on the Checkout button embedded into the area. The user will then be redirected to a web page that contains either an Order Checkout/Submission area, or a Guest Order Checkout/Submission area.
- In either area they enter details about the order.
- In either area the user clicks on the Next button embedded in the area to allow the order details to be validated, have surcharges be calculated, and a new order created with its status set to Unconfirmed.
- Once the order is created the area to redraw itself on the page with order review formats that allow the user to review the details of the order.
- The user clicks the submit button embedded in the order review formats of the area, makes any required payments, then the order is submitted. Upon successful submission an Email notification is sent to a configured Email address as configured in the project. An Email is optionally sent out to the user who submitted the order if they requested it to. The Email message contains a summary of the order, and an attachment contains the details of the order. The status of the order is updated to either unprocessed, or sent based on if the order could be sent to the connector software that is handling importing the order into its configured business system.
- The area is redrawn to show an order confirmation message, and can be set with any buttons or links to redirect the user back to another web page.
Sending Orders to External Business Systems
When an order is submitted by a user, the platform will try to send the order the Connector software as configured in the TOTECS project. The connector software is a middle man that translates the order data into a meaningful way that allows a business system to import the order.
When TOTECS passes an order the the Connector, the connector will first save the order into its own database. If this successfully occurs then it will repsond to TOTECS to tell it that it has been successfully received and allow the order status to be marked as sent. The connector then will try to send the order to the configured business system. Once this occurs the order will be marked as processed in the Connector's database. This may not neccessarily mean that the order has been imported into the business, since some business systems will have queues that need to be processed separately. Read through the Connector documentation to see the business systems it supports and the method used by the Connector to import into it.
Order Email Notifications
When orders are created by users in a TOTECS project, the platform will send out different types of Email notifications depending on the state of the order. These notifications allows users and administrators to be informed about the status of the order, and its contents,
Order Confirmation Email Notification
When a user submits an order from within the Trade interface, or from a content managed web page containing an order submission area, if the user had selected to receive a notification Email and had given their Email address, then an Order Confirmation Email will be set to them. The Order Confirmation Email provides a summary of the order in the Email's message, as well as a webpage file attachment that contains the content of the order including the ordered product lines.
Additionally the Order Confirmation Email will get sent out to an Email address configured by an administrator. This allows warehouse, or office management staff to receive a notification each and every time an order has been submitted.
The layout, styling and content of the Order Confirmation Email can be customised through the project's Administration Centre. A number of settings exist from under the Stores menu, in the Order settings interface, under the Order Notification Emails section.
Order Submission Failure Email Notification
After an order has been successfully submitted by a user through the Trade interface, or from a content managed web page containing an order submission area, the order will be attempted to be sent to the Connector software configured to the TOTECS project. The Connector software then allows the order to be submitted into 3rd party business system software. If the platform could not send the order to the Connector software, then the project can be configured to send out an Email notification advising an administrator that the order failed to send.
To enable a TOTECS project to send out Order Submission Failure Emails Notifications an administrator user must log into the Adminstration Centre. From the Stores menu click on the Orders settings menu item, for the setting labelled "Submission Failure Notification" turn it to ON, then press the save button.
The Order Submission Failure Email notification highlights to administrator the need investigate why the order could not be sent from the platform, and to enact processes to manually process the order, There can be a number of reasons why the platform cannot send an order to the Connector software, these are:
- The Connector software has not been installed on any computer.
- The TOTECS project has not been configured with the correct credentials to connect and send data to the Connector software.
- The Connector software is not running.
- The internet connection between the platform and the Connector software is unavailable or down.
- A network connection between the internet facing router and the computer that the Connector software is installed does not exist, is down, or unavailable.
- A firewall is blocking sending data from an internet router or network device to the computer where the Connector software is installed. Typically a port needs to be opened in a router's firewall settings to allow the platform to redirect data sent from the TOTECS platform to the computer where the Connector software is running.
- An operating system or anti-virus firewall is stopping the Connector software from receiving order data. An example is that Windows comes installed with its firewall software that blocks incoming traffic to the machine by default. A rule needs to be added to allow the Connector software to accept incoming data on the Connector's designated port.
- The Connector software unexpectedly stopped running while trying to import the data. This can occur if the Connector's service is manually stopped by a user, or if an unexpected crash occurred. Unexpected crashes could occur for a number of reasons:
- The computer it is installed on runs out of free memory.
- The computer it is installed on runs out of hard disk space.
- The software that the Connector uses to import the order data into a 3rd party system causes the Connector to crash.
New Pending Order Email Notification
If a user has submitted an order through the Trade interface, or from a content managed web page containing an order submission area, if the user has been assigned to managing user and the Pending Order Approvals feature has been turned on, then when the order is submitted the managing user will be notified of the pending order requiring their approval Conversely form the Trade interface if a user has assigned another user to review the order using the Order Review feature, then when the user submitted the order, its status would be set to Pending, and the New Pending Order Email Notification would be sent out to the user reviewing the order.
The layout, styling and content of the New Pending Order Email Notification can be customised through the project's Administration Centre. A number of settings exist from under the Stores menu, in the Order settings interface, under the Order Notification Emails section.
This Email notification is normally used to advise a managing user that an order requires their approval, and the steps to take to login and resolve the order. Once a manager user has approved an order then the platform will sent out an Order Confirmation Email notification, as well as a Pending Order Manager Resolution Email or Pending Order Reviewer Resolution Email to the user who submitted the order originally.
Pending Order Manager Resolution Email Notification
If a user had has submitted an order through the Trade interface, or from a content managed web page containing an order submission area, if the order status had been set to Pending because the order needed to approved by an assigned managing user, then once the managing user had approved or declinded the order the Pending Order Manager Resolution Email Notification would be sent out to the original user who created the order. This Email notification advises the orginal user if their order has been approved or declined.
The layout, styling and content of the Pending Order Manager Resolution Email Notification can be customised through the project's Administration Centre. A number of settings exist from under the Stores menu, in the Order settings interface, under the Order Notification Emails section.
Pending Order Reviewer Resolution Email Notification
If a user had has submitted an order through the Trade interface and had decided to assign another user to review the order, when the order was submitted it would have had its status set to Pending. Once the user assigned to review the order had approved or declinded the order the Pending Order Reviewer Resolution Email Notification would be sent out to the original user who created the order. This Email notification advises the orginal user if their order had been approved or declined.
The layout, styling and content of the Pending Order Reviewer Resolution Email Notification can be customised through the project's Administration Centre. A number of settings exist from under the Stores menu, in the Order settings interface, under the Order Notification Emails section.
Pending Orders Summary Email Notification
If the Purchaser Manager Approvals feature had been enabled for a TOTECS project, it is possible for TOTECS staff to configure it so that a scheduled routine is run that will check for orders that contain the status set as Pending and require approval from managing users. When this routine runs it can send out the Pending Orders Summary Email Notification that advises managing users of the number of orders requiring their approval. This notification provides a reminder for the managing users to resolve pending orders.
The layout, styling and content of the Pending Order Summary Email Notification can be customised through the project's Administration Centre. A number of settings exist from under the Stores menu, in the Order settings interface, under the Order Notification Emails section.
To have this notification be sent out on a regular basis please advise your TOTECS contact to have the notification routine set up.
Order Freight Update Email Notification
If the Integrated Freight feature has been enabled for a TOTECS project, then administrator users will have the ability to send out an Order Freight Update Email Notification that advises of the freight status of an order to the original user who submitted an order. This notification can show how far along the ordered products have progressed in being delivered. The notification can also contain information such as the freight provider who is shipping the goods, information such as tracking IDs or consignment numbers, and any customised message that an administrator user wishes to add.
The layout, styling and content of the Order Freight Update Email Notification can be customised through the project's Administration Centre. A number of settings exist from under the Stores menu, in the Order settings interface, under the Order Notification Emails section.
Orders Administration Centre Interface
Within the Administration Centre, under the Stores menu, there is a menu item for the Orders interface. WIthin the Orders interface it displays a table that lists all the orders that exist within the TOTECS project.
Administrator users can use the search form to find orders based on its ID, an account, Email address, or company name.
Once an order is found administrator users can view the details of the order, try to resend the order to the project's linked business system via the Connector software, or mark that the order has already been sent.
Please note: Unconfirmed orders that have not been submitted by a user will not displayed in the table within the interface, unless the order has had a payment applied it.
Dependent Configurations
The following configurations are dependent when users create orders:
- The user must be assigned to Facility Permission Role that allows them to submit orders.
- The user must be assigned to an active customer account that has at least one payment method assigned to it.
- To create orders on a content managed web site a Basket Product Listing area must be setup on a page with an embedded checkout button to alllow the user to checkout. A web page assigned to a secure template must be created with a Order Checkout/Submission area to allow logged in users to create orders. A web page assigned to a secure template must be created with a Guest Order Checkout/Submission area to allow guest users who are not logged in to have the abiility to created orders. If guest checkout is used then a google account needs to be setup with reCaptcha to allow the guest checkout area to work.
- To allow orders to be submitted to an external busines system, the Connector software must be installed and configured to connect to the business system, as well as the connector settings configured against the TOTECS project.
Recommendations
- Using content managed web sites to allow users to create orders allows individual styling to be set on all the of the order checkout stages.
- Setting up a Guest Checkout/Order Submission area on a content managed website allows new public users to create an order without having to register. This can help convert more retail customers into buying more products.
- Setup order surcharge rules to apply credit card fees, freight fees, and minimum order fees.