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EDI Document

EDI documents contain the same details that a paper document in a trading relationship has. We can use the X12 940 ship-from-warehouse order EDI document to illustrate this point. Manufacturers employ this EDI document to let a warehouse know they should send a delivery of a particular consignment to a trading partner. The data contained in this EDI document has at a minimum, a “ship to” address, “bill to” address, a list of product numbers and quantities. In addition to this basic EDI document data, there is often more detail depending on the requirements of the trading partners. EDI document standards are extremely comprehensive as there exist EDI documents for almost all areas of commerce, including health care (including records of patients and laboratory results), banking and mortgage finance. The EDI documents can be used in innovative ways, such as the X12 856 Advance Shipment Notification (ASN) EDI document which was created to let the recipient of a shipment know which goods will be received and how they are packaged. This is completely new trade information to send and didn’t exist prior to EDI documents.

Worldwide, there are several EDI document standards:

- The UN/EDIFACT EDI document standard, created in the 1980s by the United Nations are EDI documents for enabling global trade. These EDI documents are the most prevalent outside the United States.

- The X12 EDI documents were created by the American National Standards Institute sub section responsible for EDI documents (Accredited Standards Committee).

- EDI documents in the TRADACOMS standard were created for the British retail industry

- The ODETTE EDI documents had their origin among Europe’s automotive manufacturers.

In some cases EDI documents are being developed in the XML format, and this development was expected since the mid 1990s. However, XML documents used for trade are simply EDI documents that have been converted to XML.

Without EDI document technology in common use, international trade would be significantly slower and less efficient. EDI documents enable instantaneous transmission of trade data and trading partners can quickly adjust to shipments, manufacturing schedules, payments and many other facets of trade because of EDI document technology. In fact, every time you go in to a retailer to purchase an item, the

An EDI Document is simply another term for an electronic purchase order, invoice, shipping notice or other business document.  An EDI Document is sent using an EDI standard determined by the type of the document, the intended recipient of the document, the country the document originated in, and the country the EDI Document is being sent to.  An EDI Document is formatted according to the EDI standard that the two trading partners have agreed that they will use to communicate.  It’s important, therefore, for the recipient of the EDI Document to have software that is capable of translating the EDI Document into the correct format, regardless of where the EDI Document may have originated.  An EDI Document will also differ depending on the requirements of the company that sends it.  An EDI Document from Wal-Mart, for instance, will be slightly different from the equivalent EDI Document from Target.  That’s because each organization decides what parts of the EDI Document they care to exchange.  This “implementation guideline”, as it is called, means that each trading partner will send and receive an EDI Document according to their own needs.

When selecting the software to translate an EDI Document, it is important to know how easily that software will be able to accommodate these subtle but important variations.  As an EDI Document is received, the software must automatically recognize which company sent the EDI Document and must translate it accordingly.  EDI Software should provide basic support for the minimum EDI Document that each trading partner requires. 

An EDI Document is commonly known by the number of that EDI Document as well as  by its name.  For example, an invoice EDI Document is also often referred to as an 810 EDI Document, while a purchase order EDI Document is also often referred to as an 850 EDI Document.  This example shows that the EDI Document does not necessarily follow a logical convention. The casual reader might think that a purchase order EDI Document would have a lower number than an invoice EDI Document, since the purchase order EDI Document would always be received before an invoice EDI Document would be sent.  As you can see from the example, however, this is not so.  For all these reasons it is important that you work with a company that understands the requirements for each EDI Document  and can help you make sense of it all.