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Automating Order Processing

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Overview

The Order Manager provides several mechanisms to automate order processing once you have become familiar with the program. Automation can be accomplished through the use of system parameters settings in the Order Manager that enable users to configure the program integrate with their business operations. The Order Manager includes hundreds of System Parameters to do just that. To change a system parameter, go to the Maintenance Menu> Set System Parameters. as well as Approval Rules. Minor automation rules can be established to save a few mouse clicks here and there. Major automation rules can shave hours off the amount of time needed to fill and ship orders. Please review the automation techniques described below to find out which methods are right for you.

Automatic Order Approval

The Order Manager can be configured to allow orders which have successfully completed all phases of import processing to be automatically approved, saving the user a significant amount of time over the alternate method of manually approving each order.

If an order does not complete all phases of import processing successfully, it will not be automatically approved by the program and the user must manually review the reasons why it failed, and take action to correct the problem, and manually approve the order. Orders can be manually approved at the Orders, Multi-Order Processor, or the Manual Orders screens.  

Enabling automatic order approval can be accomplished by setting system parameter, ReviewAllOrders equal to FALSE. Refer to the Knowledge Base topic, Set System Parameters, for instructions.  

The system parameters in the chart below are also used to control the degree of order approval automation that the program can achieve.

Automatically Place Drop Ship Orders

While it can be acceptable to automatically approve orders that include drop-ships, comments and/or instructions, assuming that those matters will be reviewed at another point in the organization's work flow, it is not advisable to automatically place drop-ship orders on import, unless absolutely confident in the fraud protection measures that are in place. See system parameter, DropShipAutoOrder.

If the following conditions are met, a customer can place an order for a drop-ship item and the purchase order will be sent to the supplier vendor without any human intervention on the part of the merchant:

• ApproveOrdersWithDropShips is set to TRUE

• DropShipAutoOrder is set to TRUE

• all import processing steps complete successfully and the order is approved

• all inventory items have Primary Suppliers defined, and those suppliers are configured to receive drop-ship purchase orders via email or fax

Automating Credit Card Payments

• Approval rules are checked before credit card charges are processed. Since charges are only processed if an order can be approved, the rules that are defined may affect whether credit card transactions are processed as orders are imported.

Capturing Payment of Authorized Transactions when an Order is Manually Approved

• To automatically capture credit card payments that were pre-authorized at either the Manual Orders screen synonymous with the Microsoft Access Form Object or user interface. or at the shopping cart an e-commerce software system that allows a merchant to sell products on the Web. In the context of the Order Manager, it refers to the settings that describe a merchants web store to the program, allowing it communicate with the online shopping cart and import orders, and other information etc. (WebTransactionType=PRE-AUTHORIZE) as the order is manually approved, set system parameter CaptureAtManualApproval equal to TRUE. Refer to the Knowledge Base topic, Set System Parameters, for instructions.  

Orders Manually Approved at the Manual Orders Screen

• When an order is manually approved and the order contains a pre-authorized credit card payment, the Approval Options screen will show the credit card information and capture the payment when the Approve this Order box is checked and one of the Approval buttons is clicked (outlined in red below). The Capture Payment? check box will be marked by default.

Figure 1: Approval Options screen - system parameter CaptureAtManualApproval equal to TRUE

Figure 2: Approval Options screen - system parameter CaptureAtManualApproval equal to FALSE

Orders Manually Approved at the (View) Orders Screen

• When an order is manually approved at the Orders screen, the Print Options screen appears, showing the Credit Card Payment information in the lower left hand corner of the screen.

Figure 3: Print Options screen - system parameter CaptureAtManualApproval equal to TRUE

Figure 4: Print Options screen - system parameter CaptureAtManualApproval equal to FALSE

Orders Manually Approved via the Multi-Order Processor Screen

• Orders can be approved and credit card transactions can be executed as a batch from the Multi-Order Processor screen. Therefore, a separate screen showing the amount to capture, such as the ones that will appear at the (View) Orders or Manual Orders screens, will not be seen. Instead the user must choose the appropriate mode that the program should use when processing a batch of orders. Ergo, every order in the current batch must require the same credit card transaction mode or they are not suitable batch mates.

Figure 5: Multi-Order Processor screen - how to select to mouse "left-click" on an object, usually a row in a table, in the context of Order Manager documentation the appropriate Credit Card Processing Mode

Capturing Payment for Authorized Transactions when an Order is Automatically Approved at Import

• If credit card charges are authorized but not captured at the shopping cart, it is possible to have the Order Manager capture payment for the order during the direct Internet order import process. To do so, set system parameters, CaptureApprovedOrdersAtImport to TRUE and ReviewAllOrders to FALSE. Refer to the Knowledge Base topic, Set System Parameters, for instructions.  

• This configuration will cause the program to automatically approve any orders that successfully complete all phases of import processing successfully. If the program is unable to capture the payment, the order will not be approved, and the user will have to manually review the order and correct the problem.  

Automatically Charging Credit Cards and Approving Orders at Import

• It is possible to have the Order Manager charge credit cards (sale transaction) as orders are imported. If credit card transactions are not pre-authorized or captured at the shopping cart, the Order Manager can be configured to automatically attempt to capture payment (sale transaction) for the order at the time of import by setting system parameters ChargeCardsAtImport to TRUE and ReviewAllOrders to FALSE.  If the program is not able to successfully capture the payment, the order will not be approved, and the user will have to manually review the order and make any corrections before the order is then manually approved at the (View) Orders or Multi-Order Processor screens.  

Created: 3/17/11

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