This article provides you with an overview of the most common workflows for working with a fulfillment service provider and the settings you need to make in Xentral. This article provides detailed instructions on the settings that are absolutely mandatory, as well as some recommendations and hints on optional features that are labeled accordingly.
Tip
Video tutorial: Your head start on the practical examples for fulfillment integrations
Are you looking for a quick overview on the practical examples for fulfillment integrations in Xentral? Then, our video tutorial is exactly right for you. Take a look right away!
Important
The following content assumes that you have already completed the basic setup steps required in Xentral. If you are unsure or would like to review the information again, read our Preparatory Settings in Xentral article. The following steps must be completed before you can proceed with the settings for each workflow:
For each use case, you create separate transfers in Xentral (sometimes referred to as transfer accounts or accounts).
For example, if you only want to transfer delivery notes, you need a separate transfer for this purpose, and for any additional actions, such as importing tracking information back into Xentral, you need additional transfers.
Tip
Using the information on this page, you can set up the data exchange to transfer the most commonly needed standard data. If you are interested in advanced use cases, or if you want to adjust the structures within the data exchange independently, you need to take further steps. With the appropriate technical knowledge, you can personalize the data exchange to a high degree. To do this, check out our information on Smarty:
When you submit delivery notes created in Xentral to your fulfillment service provider, the staff in the fulfillment warehouse can see which products need to be shipped based on the delivery notes. This means that you process your orders regularlyXentral up to and including the handover to auto-shipping and thus the generation of the delivery note. The delivery notes are then transmitted by means of a separate transfer to the fulfillment service provider who then handles the further shipping process.
Create a new transfer to allow delivery notes to be sent to your fulfillment service provider by following these steps.
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Open the Settings > Administration > Data exchange > Transfers (CSV/XML/EDI/PDF) menu.
Or: Use the Smart Search to search for the Transfers (CSV/XML/EDI/PDF) module.
-
Click on + New in the upper right corner.
-
Carry out the settings as described below, then click on Save.
|
Option |
Setting |
|---|---|
|
Active |
Activate this option to enable data exchange and thus transfer delivery notes to your fulfillment service provider. |
|
Designation |
Enter a name for the transfer you create to submit delivery notes. The name should be unique to you and your employees and is not visible outside your Xentral system. |
|
Option |
Setting |
|---|---|
|
API |
Select the API account you previously created for the transfer. You can find more information on how to create the API account in Xentral here. |
|
Transfer format |
Select the desired file format in which you want to transfer delivery notes from your Xentral system, we recommend transferring delivery notes via CSV or XML. |
|
Type |
We recommend that you select the SFTP option here. |
|
Server |
Specify the server to which the transfer will be directed. This information is usually obtained from your fulfillment service provider. |
|
Port |
Enter the specific port of the server you selected earlier that receives the transfer, This information is usually provided by your fulfillment service provider. |
|
Username |
Enter your user name for the server you specified earlier. This information is usually provided by your fulfillment service provider. |
|
Password |
Provide the password for your access to the server if needed. This information is usually provided by your fulfillment service provider. |
|
Speicherort (Ausgang) |
Specify the location on the server where the outgoing delivery notes are stored. This information is usually obtained from your fulfillment service provider. Tip: Use relative paths when specifying the location. |
|
Dateiname Prefix |
Optional: Enter a prefix that each delivery note automatically receives as part of the transfer, so that you can more easily distinguish transferred delivery notes later based on various features, such as the project. |
|
Option |
Setting |
|---|---|
|
Receipt type |
Select the Delivery note option. |
|
Receipt status |
Enter the status in which delivery notes must be in order for them to be transmitted. In most use cases, the “FREIGEGEBEN” input is correct here. This means that delivery notes will be transmitted as soon as you have released them in your Xentral system. However, you can also select a different receipt status here depending on your needs. Always use the exact spelling for the status as it is also specified in your Xentral system. Otherwise, errors will occur during the transmission. |
|
Project |
Select the project whose delivery notes should be transferred. |
|
Contacts or Group |
Optional: Select a specific contact or group to limit transmission to delivery notes of sales orders that are directed to that exact address or group. |
|
Manual approval required |
Optional: If you enable this option, you will need to release each delivery note individually for transfer before the transfer takes place. This setting can be useful if you want to test your transfer at the beginning. You can deactivate this option at any time to automatically transfer delivery notes afterwards. As long as the Manual approval required option is enabled, you have to manually release the individual receipts for transfer by clicking on the Wait for approval tab on the Transfers (CSV/XML/EDI/PDF) menu. |
|
Start from ID or Start from date |
Decide on a specific delivery note ID and date from which you want the delivery notes to be transferred to your fulfillment service provider. The delivery notes will be sent as soon as both conditions apply simultaneously. |
|
Filter labels |
Attention: This option will only appear after you have saved the settings for the transfer once! Labels allow you to distinguish the delivery notes contained in the transfer at a glance in your Xentral system and filter by special labels. First, use the Filter labels option to determine which labels you want to filter by within the transfer. Then use the Successful transfer label and Bad transmission label options to select a label for these scenarios. In these cases, the label will then be automatically assigned to the affected delivery notes and displayed in your Xentral system. Click the filter icons next to the options mentioned to see a list of all available labels. Scroll down to the bottom of the list to create new labels if necessary and use them directly. |
|
Each receipt in own XML |
If you are using the XML transfer format, we recommend that you enable this option so that each delivery note is submitted in a separate XML file. |
In this use case, we will show you how to create a transfer so that tracking information is automatically transferred from your fulfillment service provider to your Xentral system. After your fulfillment service provider has picked and packed the goods you need for the orders, the next step is to ship the goods. Each package that is shipped to your end customers is given a shipment number and a tracking link. Xentral then requests this data from your fulfillment service provider's server and then imports it into your system - it is an incoming data movement. You can then provide this information to your customers to inform them about the shipment of the goods and allow them to track the shipments.
Create a new transfer to allow feedback of tracking information from your fulfillment service provider. To do so, proceed as described below.
-
Open the Settings > Administration > Data exchange > Transfers (CSV/XML/EDI/PDF) menu.
Or: Use the Smart Search to search for the Transfers (CSV/XML/EDI/PDF) module.
-
Click on + New in the upper right corner.
-
Carry out the settings as described below, then click on Save.
|
Option |
Setting |
|---|---|
|
Active |
Activate this option to enable the data transfer and thus receive tracking information from your fulfillment service provider. |
|
Designation |
Enter a name for the transfer you create to receive tracking information. The name should be unique to you and your employees and is not visible outside your Xentral system. |
|
Option |
Setting |
|---|---|
|
API |
Select the API account you previously created for the transfer. You can find more information on how to create the API account in Xentral here. |
|
Transfer format |
Select the desired file format in which tracking information should be transferred into your Xentral system. We recommend transferring tracking information via XML. |
|
Type |
We recommend that you select the SFTP option here. |
|
Server |
Specify the server from which you want to collect the tracking information. This information is usually provided by your fulfillment service provider. |
|
Port |
Enter the specific port of the server you selected earlier that receives the transfer. This information is usually provided by your fulfillment service provider. |
|
Username |
Enter your user name for the server you specified earlier. This information is usually provided by your fulfillment service provider. |
|
Password |
Provide the password for your access to the server if needed. This information is usually provided by your fulfillment service provider. |
|
Speicherort (Ausgang) |
Specify the location on the server from the tracking information is collected. This information is usually provided by your fulfillment service provider. Tip: Use relative paths when specifying the location. |
|
Dateiname Prefix |
Enter a prefix to only transfer files to Xentral that contain that prefix. In any case, check with your fulfillment service provider before using this setting. Note that files without this prefix will not be transferred to your Xentral system. |
|
Option |
Setting |
|---|---|
|
Tracking received |
Activate this option to enable the data transfer and thus receive tracking information from your fulfillment service provider. |
|
Retrieve declared BBD / batches from stock |
This option is only relevant if you maintain best-before dates or batch numbers on your products. If you enable this option, no stocks are booked out, but the corresponding BBD and batch information is automatically transferred to the delivery note and database. |
|
Option |
Setting |
|---|---|
|
Receipt type |
Select the setting - no receipts - here, as you don't want to send receipts, but want to receive tracking information. |
|
Tracking mail |
Activate this option to automatically send an email with the tracking information to your customers after the relevant information from your fulfillment service provider has been transferred to your Xentral system. |
|
Invoice mail |
Optional: Enable this option to automatically send an email with the invoice to your customers after the relevant information from your fulfillment service provider has been transferred to your Xentral system. Important: The prerequisite for sending this email is that an invoice has already been created in your Xentral system for the relevant orders.This invoice must contain the full name and email address of the customer and the invoice amount must be greater than 0,00 €. |
|
Create invoice |
Optional: If you activate this option, an invoice for the corresponding order will be automatically created after the tracking information has been provided in Xentral, and in case the receipt has not yet been generated at that point. |
Create a new transfer to allow stock feedback from your fulfillment service provider. To do so, proceed as described below.
-
Open the Settings > Administration > Data exchange > Transfers (CSV/XML/EDI/PDF) menu.
Or: Use the Smart Search to search for the Transfers (CSV/XML/EDI/PDF) module.
-
Click on + New in the upper right corner.
-
Carry out the settings as described below, then click on Save.
|
Option |
Setting |
|---|---|
|
Active |
Activate this option to enable the data transfer and thus receive stock information from your fulfillment service provider. |
|
Designation |
Enter a name for the transfer you create to receive stock numbers. The name should be unique to you and your employees and is not visible outside your Xentral system. |
|
Option |
Setting |
|---|---|
|
API |
Select the API account you previously created for the transfer. You can find more information on how to create the API account in Xentral here. |
|
Transfer format |
Select the desired file format in which stock numbers should be transferred into your Xentral system. We recommend transferring the data via XML. |
|
Type |
We recommend that you select the SFTP option here. |
|
Server |
Specify the server from which you want to collect the stock information. This information is usually provided by your fulfillment service provider. |
|
Port |
Enter the specific port of the server you selected earlier that receives the transfer. This information is usually provided by your fulfillment service provider. |
|
Username |
Enter your user name for the server you specified earlier. This information is usually provided by your fulfillment service provider. |
|
Password |
Provide the password for your access to the server if needed. This information is usually provided by your fulfillment service provider. |
|
Speicherort (Ausgang) |
Specify the location on the server from which the stock information is collected. This information is usually provided by your fulfillment service provider. Tip: Use relative paths when specifying the location. |
|
Dateiname Prefix |
Optional: Enter a prefix to only transfer files to Xentral that contain that prefix. In any case, check with your fulfillment service provider before using this setting. Note that files without this prefix will not be transferred to your Xentral system. |
|
Option |
Setting |
|---|---|
|
Received stock numbers |
Activate this option to enable the data transfer and thus receive stock information from your fulfillment service provider. |
|
Ignore storage location in file inbox |
If your fulfillment service provider reports storage locations back to you within an XML file, the corresponding stock is booked on the storage location in Xentral that you have specified in the transfer settings. If you enable this setting, this also applies if different storage spaces are specified in the submitted XML file. If this setting is disabled, the storage spaces submitted by the fulfillment service provider are applied. We recommend that you always enable this setting. |
|
Warehouse |
If your fulfillment service provider reports stock back to Xentral without a specific storage location, this is the storage location to which the items in question are booked. This way, you can regularly check this storage location specifically and rebook the items to their final storage locations. |
|
Storage behaviour |
Here we recommend selecting the Overwrite option. |
If you create new items in Xentral or change data on existing products, for example by adjusting information such as the product name, you can also communicate these changes via a transfer to your fulfillment service provider. The fulfillment service provider will store and ship these products for you.
Important
Note that changed product data is never automatically transferred to the fulfillment service provider. You must initiate this process manually by using the Transfer items button in the transfer settings. However, you have the option to transfer newly created products automatically. See the table below for more information.
Create a new transfer to send product data to your fulfillment service provider. To do so, proceed as described below.
-
Open the Settings > Administration > Data exchange > Transfers (CSV/XML/EDI/PDF) menu.
Or: Use the Smart Search to search for the Transfers (CSV/XML/EDI/PDF) module.
-
Click on + New in the upper right corner.
-
Carry out the settings as described below, then click on Save.
|
Option |
Setting |
|---|---|
|
Active |
Activate this option to enable data exchange and thus transfer product data to your fulfillment service provider. |
|
Designation |
Assign a name for the transfer you create to transfer product data to your fulfillment service provider. The name should be unique to you and your employees and not visible outside your Xentral system. |
|
Option |
Setting |
|---|---|
|
API |
Select the API account you previously created for the transfer. You can find more information on how to create the API account in Xentral here. |
|
Transfer format |
Select the file format in which you want product data to be transferred from your Xentral system to your fulfillment service provider. We recommend transferring it via XML. |
|
Type |
Select the desired type of file transfer you want here. You will usually get information on the correct type from your fulfillment service provider. |
|
Server |
Specify the server from which you want to collect the stock information. This information is usually provided by your fulfillment service provider. |
|
Port |
Enter the specific port of the server you selected earlier that receives the transfer. This information is usually provided by your fulfillment service provider. |
|
Username |
Enter your user name for the server you specified earlier. This information is usually provided by your fulfillment service provider. |
|
Password |
Provide the password for your access to the server if needed. This information is usually provided by your fulfillment service provider. |
|
Option |
Setting |
|---|---|
|
Transfer item |
Click on this button to transfer new and changed product data to your fulfillment service provider's system. |
|
Automatically transfer new products |
Activate this option to automatically transfer newly created products from Xentral to your fulfillment service provider. Note, however, that this setting does not apply if you change data from existing items to Xentral. If you change product data, you must use the Transfer item option to submit these changes manually every time. |