In many trading and distribution companies, an order is typed several times before it is invoiced. It arrives by phone, by email or through an online store, then someone copies it into the ERP, then into a tracking spreadsheet, and sometimes again when the invoice is made. Each copy takes time and each copy can introduce an error. This article explains where re-keying comes from and how to connect your tools without changing software.
Where re-keying happens
The same points come up again and again:
- Order entry. An order received outside the ERP (email, online store, a sales rep in the field) is copied in by hand.
- Stock. The stock level lives in the ERP, but the sales team or the store works from a figure exported the day before, or from a separate spreadsheet.
- Delivery. The delivery note or the carrier’s tracking is typed again to inform the customer or to close the order.
- Invoice and payment. The invoice is redone in another tool, or the payment received is matched to the invoice by hand.
- Reporting. The weekly table is rebuilt from several exports.
A simple exercise: for each of these points, write down who types the data, how many times a week, and in which tool. The list you end up with is your re-keying map.
Why not replace everything
The most visible answer is to change ERP for a tool that does everything. Sometimes that is justified, but it means migrating data, retraining teams and accepting a period when nothing works as before. Often the current ERP does its job well; what is missing are the links between it and the other tools. Connecting usually causes less disruption than replacing, and each team keeps the tool it knows.
What to check in the ERP
Before pricing anything, three questions:
- The way in and out. Does the ERP have an API, a structured export, an import, or read access to its database? This depends on the vendor, the version and the hosting, and is checked case by case.
- Identifiers. Are the order number, the item reference and the customer code unique and stable? They are what lets two systems be matched.
- The owner of each piece of data. For each item (price, stock, delivery address), one system is the reference. The others read it.
What a good integration must guarantee
Connecting two systems is not just copying data from one to the other. Three guarantees make the difference:
- No duplicates. Every exchange carries an identifier. If a system goes down, the work is queued and resumed without creating a second order, invoice or payment.
- A readable log. You can see what went out, what came back and what failed, without opening the code.
- Safe retries. When a send fails, it is replayed automatically or flagged to a person, never silently lost.
A four step method
- Map. The re-keying map described above, with volumes.
- Pick one flow. The most frequent one, or the one that produces the most errors, for example orders from the online store into the ERP.
- Connect and measure. Build that one link, run it on real orders, count what was avoided.
- Extend. Move to the next flow only when the first one runs without intervention.
What about e-invoicing?
If you already invoice from your ERP, the same reasoning applies to El Fatoora: the point is not to change tools, but to get each invoice out in the right format and send it to TTN. We cover this in connecting Odoo or Sage to El Fatoora.
What we do
Axynoxia connects the ERP, invoicing and the tools your team already uses, with scope and price fixed before work starts, with a log, retries without duplicates and documentation. See our software integration service or book a discovery call.