About EDI for Purchasing
This section is intended to give you an overview of the various EDI implementations in the EPASS Purchasing system.
What is EDI?
EDI (Electronic Data Interchange) is a standardized format for exchanging information between two companies electronically rather than using paper documents. Business entities conducting business electronically are called trading partners.
There are several EDI standards (International and North American) that define the file formats that are exchanged between trading partners. EPASS does not use these EDI file formats directly. We use an EDI VAN (Value Added Network) to manage transmission of our data (usually in Excel or CSV).
You may see the term EDI used in various places in EPASS, as we do have other EDI integrations. This document focuses specifically on the EDI integrations for Purchasing.
Supported EDI Formats
Each exchange of information (each file) via EDI has a numerical transaction code. This code is used to reference the file's purpose and the information it contains.
Also, each file is either Inbound or Outbond. Inbound files are created by the data VAN company and placed onto your server. Outbound files are created by EPASS and are sent to the data VAN company.
EPASS currently supports the following EDI transaction codes:
| Transaction Code | Type | Description |
|---|---|---|
| 846 Inventory Inquiry | Inbound | The 846 is an Inventory Inquiry/Advice file. For EPASS it means getting the Supplier’s QOH and optionally their QOO with an ETA Date. |
| 850 Purchase Order | Outbound | The 850 is a new Purchase Order. For EPASS it means sending new PO’s including supplier details, ship to address, model lines, and requested ship date. |
| 855 Purchase Order Acknowledgment | Inbound | The 855 is a PO Acknowledgment. For EPASS it means updating the POModel ETA Date. |
| 860 Purchase Order Change Request | Outbound | The 860 is a PO Change Request. For EPASS it means tracking changes on a PO after the PO had been sent via an 850, then sending those changes to the supplier. We use an EDIChanges tables to track changes that were made for this purpose. |
Contact EPASS Support
For help with EDI setup in EPASS, please contact our Support department and one of our representatives will be happy to help.
See Also
- Scheduling an Automatic Import of Supplier Data Files
- Creating a PO
- Ordering on a PO Manually
- Receiving a PO Manually
June 6, 2025