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Chapter 2 How Does BuyerXpert/SellerXpert Work?
The following sections are contained in this chapter:
BuyerXpert/SellerXpert People
BuyerXpert/SellerXpert People
There are a number of people in the organization who are involved with BuyerXpert/SellerXpert:
Users
In the BuyerXpert environment, users are procurement professionals or other employees of the buyer organization who are buying items from catalogs that belong to other organizations. These catalogs are hosted in the buying organization's environment.In the SellerXpert environment, users are either B2C individuals who buy items on their own, or B2B individuals who are authorized to shop for items for their organization. These users go to seller sites where SellerXpert allows them to select and order items in the catalogs that are hosted by a seller organization.
A buyer is a member of the BuyerXpert or SellerXpert community who can request sales quotes, browse a catalog, place an order, and track purchases.
Note For SellerXpert, a buyer can log in as a guest without being an established member.
A buyer logs into the web browser interface.
The buyer searches available catalogs and selects items to buy.
Note For SellerXpert, if the user is logged in as a guest, the user must register before checking out.
The buyer reviews selections and continues shopping.
The buyer begins the checkout process.
The buyer is prompted to confirm checkout; a message is displayed when the checkout is successful.
For SellerXpert, the order is electonically submitted to the seller for fulfillment.
The buyer can view order details and track the order.
- For BuyerXpert, the requisition is electronically submitted for approval. After approval, it is submitted as an order to the seller.
Administrators
An administrator is an employee of the buyer or seller organization who performs such administrative tasks as:
Installing and upgrading the product
An organization can have more than one administrator. For example, one administrator may be responsible for maintaining catalogs, while another administrator may be responsible for maintaining member profiles for the organization.Staring up and shutting down the systems and components
Setting up access control to BuyerXpert/SellerXpert resources
Defining the members within a buyer organization and assigning privileges associated with that organization
Administering electronic catalogs
Managing the BuyerXpert/SellerXpert data, including creating, updating, and deleting data using the graphical interfaces or Import utility
Administrator Roles for the Multi-Organizational Structure
BuyerXpert/SellerXpert administration is a multi-tiered process that works through privilege levels associated with three distinct administrator roles: the superadmin, the orgadmin, and the selfadmin. These roles are assigned during BuyerXpert/SellerXpert implementation.
Superadmin (super administrator)—Can do all that is possible through the administrative utilities and interfaces of BuyerXpert/SellerXpert, including interactive administration and importing data. The superadmin has full create-read-update-delete privileges across organizations. This role has no administrative restrictions.
BuyerXpert/SellerXpert determines what a particular administrator can do with a resource by consulting the privilege table for that resource.Orgadmin (organization administrator)—Can administer various resources within the domain of the orgadmin's organization. An orgadmin has full create-read-update-delete privileges within an organization.
Selfadmin (self administrator)—Can administer only self and self-related entities and attributes. This is the most restrictive role and is the default.
Note For further information on resources and privileges, refer to the resources chapters and appendix in the Administrator's Guide.
Approvers (BuyerXpert Only)
An approver is an employee of the buyer organization who is responsible for reviewing and approving requisitions that are created using BuyerXpert. There can be a number of approvers in the approval cycle for a particular organization. This cycle is set up by the superadmin in an approval matrix.
Hierarchical approver—person who manages the buyer who created the requisition; could include a hierarchy of managers above the buyer
Approval authorization can be delegated to another BuyerXpert member if the organization approval matrix is set up to allow delegation.Commodity approver—person who is responsible for a particular category of products or services in the organization, such as office supplies or computer equipment
Cost center approver—person responsible for a particular cost center or department of the organization
Approver pool—a group of users, any or all of whom can function as the approver, depending on the approval chain of the organization
Off-catalog approver—person who determines what to purchase if an item cannot be ordered through a catalog
Note Further information can be found in the BuyerXpert online Help and the resources setup chapter of the Administrator's Guide.
BuyerXpert/SellerXpert Components
The components that form the processing framework for BuyerXpert and SellerXpert are:
Multi-Organizational Structure
Guest Login (SellerXpert Only)
Sales Quote (SellerXpert Only)
Email Shopping Cart (SellerXpert Only)
Supplier Performance (BuyerXpert Only)
Multi-Organizational Structure
BuyerXpert/SellerXpert provides a multi-organizational approach that allows unique business rules to be applied to subdivisions of an enterprise. That is, within a single instance of BuyerXpert/SellerXpert, an enterprise can be divided into multiple organizations or divisions, each of which can have unique access control, catalogs, price lists, locales, currencies, bill-to and ship-to locations, adjustments, and payment methods.Multi-locale and multi-currency functionality allows great flexibility in tailoring BuyerXpert/SellerXpert to the specific profile of your organization.
Multi-Locale
The term multi-locale refers to the situation where multiple locale presentations can be used simultaneously within one BuyerXpert/SellerXpert system. For example, one user may be using French and another German.
Language and/or language variant (fr / de / en-us / en-uk)
The locale is independent of the currency, and the currency is independent of the locale. For example, locale doesn't determine how many significant digits are shown, and the currency doesn't determine the number format.Page layout—required to handle string expansion and/or text that reads in directions other than left-to-right, top-to-bottom.
Graphics—different graphics may be needed due to page layout or cultural differences
Multi-Currency
The term multi-currency refers to support for multiple currencies (Euro, USD and others) within one BuyerXpert/SellerXpert system. With multi-currency functionality, the preferred currency can be displayed for:
Access Control
A business community is a hierarchy of organizations, organizational units, users, user groups, and locations. For BuyerXpert/SellerXpert, this hierarchical model is represented in the directory structure of Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP).The security policy for a business community is a defined, administered, reconciled plan, based on the hierarchical model of the particular business community. A security policy includes access control mechanisms that are used to protect resources from unauthorized access and manipulation. There are three primary goals of any security system:
Confidentiality—Data cannot be viewed by members who are not intended to view it.
Integrity—Data cannot be modified by members who are not intended to modify it.
Accountability—All relevant access and modification events should be capable of being logged for future auditing and verification purposes.
- Integrity depends on the principle of least privilege, that is, a member is given no more than the minimum privilege required to perform a task, as opposed to trusting the member's good intentions.
Privileges
In a security system, authentication involves verification of the identity of a member by a trusted system. Authentication is about who you are. Authorization involves verifying the actions that are allowed for that particular member. Authorization is about what you can do.Assigning privileges to a member is how that member's access to resources is determined. A privilege level can be made up of a number of permissions that specifically define what a member can and cannot do in particular circumstances. A permission is constructed using the resource name, the member identification, and the action name.
Access to Resources
A resource, also known as a business object, is typically a piece of business data, such as a record in a database. The manipulation of resources involves the performance of a business task, such as creating an order, by a person who is a member of the BuyerXpert/SellerXpert business community.
Note See the Administrator's Guide for more information on access and resources.
Membership
Members are participants in the BuyerXpert/SellerXpert system and have permission to access particular BuyerXpert/SellerXpert functions and data. The concept of members is not restricted to users. In addition to buyer and seller organization people, members include the buyer and seller organizations, user groups, organizational units, and locations for shipping, receiving, and payment information.Membership refers to the roles, permissions, and authorizations associated with each member. When BuyerXpert or SellerXpert is set up, the administrator creates a unique user ID and password for each user, as well as each user's membership profile.
BuyerXpert/SellerXpert members are:
Organization
An organization is a company, government body, or institution that participates in the buying or selling process. This includes the buyer organization, the seller organization, the shipper organization, and so on.An organization represents a collection of users, locations, sub-organizations, organizational units and user groups that carry on the day-to-day business operations. An organization can have unique access control, catalogs, price lists, locales, currencies, bill-to and ship-to locations, business rules, adjustments, and payment methods.
At the top of its domain, the organization forms the root of the membership hierarchy.
Note In the BuyerXpert/SellerXpert multi-organizational environment, there can be many organizations, each with their own domains.
Organizational Unit
An organizational unit is a grouping of users, usually along a specific line of work in the day-to-day operation of the organization. An organization can be divided into one or more organizational units, each of which can be further be subdivided into more organizational units (nesting).An organizational unit can have unique locations and catalogs.
A user does not have to belong to an organizational unit, but cannot belong to more than one.
User
Users are people who belong to an organization and perform the day-to-day tasks within the procurement enterprise. Buyers, sellers, and administrators are all users.Users have differing privileges, based on the requirements of the organization and enforced by the membership hierarchy and access control directives. User permissions can be based on organization, organizational unit, and/or user group.
Although users can only belong to a single organizational unit (or none), they can belong to many user groups.
User Group
A user group is a role-based grouping of users within an organization that has its own business rules and access control policies. User groups are used primarily to define roles among users, such as setting privileges for a group of users rather than setting these privileges separately for each individual.In many ways, user groups resemble organizational units, but organizational units have stricter limitations regarding user membership. Unlike organizational units, a user can belong to many user groups.
User groups cannot be divided into sub-user groups.
Location
A location represents a destination point for shipping, receiving, billing, and so on. BuyerXpert/SellerXpert locations include:These locations could have the same physical address, or could all have different addresses.
Note See the resources chapters in the Administrator's Guide for more information.
Business Rules
Business rules are configurable, generalized statements that define the specifics of applying processing methods to a particular set of data. Business rules determine privileges, acceptable processes, relationships between BuyerXpert/SellerXpert participants, and defaults. The business rules semantics are not as complex as a full programming language, so programming experience is not required to perform typical configurations.Business rules determine such things as:
Relationships between buyer and seller organizations
Applicability of business processes, such as buying with credit cards
Choices and default values for options, such as ship-to address or payment methods
Example
Rule instance named LINE_DISCOUNT:Buyer==AOL & Seller==Sun & Product==Computers => Line Discount=10%
This example rule is made up of a number of elements that state if the buyer organization is AOL, the seller is Sun, and the product is computers, BuyerXpert/SellerXpert will apply a 10% line discount to an order.
Note Refer to the online Help and the business rules chapter in the Administrator's Guide for more information.
Catalog Manager
To make their products available to buyers, sellers organize product information into catalogs. The product information structure in a catalog is a hierarchy of categories, with items under those categories. The ways of representing this information vary from buyer to buyer, depending on the buyer profile.Catalog management is simplified by a set of tools which allow sellers to map existing catalogs to the BuyerXpert/SellerXpert environment. Using a graphical interface or a batch update process, sellers can organize and import their catalog data for the BuyerXpert/SellerXpert environment. After a catalog is imported and a master catalog is created, buyer organizations are able to create private buyer catalogs for specific groups within their organizations. This allows buyer organizations to control excessive and maverick spending.
Catalog Manager allows for quick, real-time catalog creation and maintenance by providing the following product catalog-related capabilities:
Creation of seller-managed content through an internal product catalog system
Users who have browsing privileges can browse the buyer catalogs created for their user groups. A buyer searches and locates catalog items, views item details, compares catalog items, picks and adds catalog items to an electronic shopping cart, and creates orders.Graphical interface for catalog design and product classification
Support for schema to follow United Nations Standard Products and Services Codes (UNSPSC), or other structure, if desired
Access to remote seller-managed web-based content via OBI standard (BuyerXpert only)
Catalog Manager enables the following:
The administrator can create and maintain a standardized structure (master ontology) that maps catalog data to the BuyerXpert/SellerXpert environment.
The administrator can manage catalog data using the Catalog Manager graphical interface or the batch process Import utility.
The administrator can create and manage group-specific buyer catalogs.
The administrator can add items to seller catalogs and manage catalogs online.
Users can perform advanced, keyword, and parametric searches on catalogs and perform side-by-side comparisons of items.
Users can generate orders.
Note Further information and procedures are contained in the Catalog interface Help and in the catalog chapter of the Administrator's Guide.
Guest Login (SellerXpert Only)
Guest login allows guest users to enter the storefront and perform many operations, such as browsing the catalog, adding items to the shopping cart, and checking for prices. The option to open an account and register is available at any time. After registration is complete, the guest user is returned to the same screen to continue shopping.
Sales Quote (SellerXpert Only)
A sales quote is a snapshot of a shopping cart that is saved for a specific number of days as determined by the business rules. This quote is a legally binding price quotation and can be viewed at any time. You can repurchase as many times as you like using the same quote, as long as the quote is still valid.
Email Shopping Cart (SellerXpert Only)
The email shopping cart feature allows you to send the details about a shopping cart to a specified email address. The quantity, item description, cost, order number, and any message you want to add is sent to the recipient.
Order Process
The order process handles the core processing of orders, including creating sales quotes, placing orders, and tracking order status. Using data from business rules, member profiles, product lists, price lists, default order settings, and calculation formulas, the order process assembles first a requisition, then an order that is ready to be sent to the backend system of the seller organization.You can configure the BuyerXpert/SellerXpert order process to:
Create orders by browsing catalogs
Determine contract pricing with discounts, charges, allowances, and promotions
Estimate freight charges based on shipping point and carrier selection
Support credit and check (bank account) payment methods
Search by full or partial shipment of goods
Support repeat order templates and multiple orders in progress
Note Refer to the Admin interface Help and the Administrator's Guide for more information.
Contract Tracking
Contract tracking provides the ability to associate a line item on a requisition with any contracts indicated by the contract identifier code(s) for that item. The requisitioner can click a link to display a contract document.
Approval (BuyerXpert Only)
The BuyerXpert approval process is a series of pre-defined approval tasks through which a purchase requisition is routed. The desired action is the approval of the requisition; the tangible result is a purchase order (approved) that can be sent to a seller for fulfillment.
The approval process performs the following:
Adheres to a rule-based process flow as determined by your organization. A process flow is a set of procedural steps that establish approval paths.
Determines which process steps to take based on the person who creates the requisition. This allows different process sequences to occur for different users and organizations. Approval pools can be designated.
In conjunction with a specific process flow, evaluates a requisition based on such data as purchase amount and employee role to create an approval case made up of one or more process instances.
Routes requisitions according to an approver matrix, which is based on:
Sends notification emails throughout the approval process.
Delegates approval authority according to an approval delegation table.
Receiving (BuyerXpert Only)
The BuyerXpert receiving process provides the following capabilities:
Either desktop or centralized receiving
When the items ordered arrive from the seller, the following information is captured by the receiving process:Delivery package tracking and searching by order number
The delivery package is tracked by purchase order number. You can search receipts by purchase order number, status, and so on.
A seller may deliver a partial order. That is, some items on the order are delivered and some items are not, or the quantity of an item is only partially delivered, with the rest to arrive later.
Receiving status on a line item is either fully received or partially received. After an order is either fully received or partially received, the order cannot be cancelled. The receiving process allows you to query what quantities or items are received thus far. The receiving history shows the date and quantity of items received on a purchase order.
Note Further information can be found in the BuyerXpert online Help and the Administrator's Guide.
Supplier Performance (BuyerXpert Only)
Supplier (seller) performance provides the ability to track and compare sellers based on criteria such as quality of goods, quality of service, and timeliness of delivery. This feature allows customers to manually enter performance data, automatically collect basic receiving data, and report on data collected.
A user can enter quality metrics for any given line item.
The system can be configured to support a variable number of quality fields.
Options for each quality field are configurable, and can vary by product or commodity code.
Automated supplier performance tracking/reporting uses Order Acknowledgement (ACK), Advanced Shipping Notice (ASN), and damaged goods reporting.
A person other than the requisitioner can receive On Behalf Of.
Note Information on how to customize supplier performance is contained in the customization chapter of the Administrator's Guide.
Invoice Matching (BuyerXpert Only)
Invoice matching is a payment strategy whereby the recipient pays for shipped goods upon arrival only under certain conditions. Payment is authorized only if the prices and goods of the purchase order, the invoice, and the products received match. The matching process is triggered by either an invoice or a receipt.If validation fails, the invoice is routed to an authorized user and email notification is sent.
An authorized user can view, update, resubmit, defer, or reassign an invoice.
An item can be invoiced, but not received, or received but not invoiced.
Note Information on how to customize invoice matching is contained in the customization chapter of the Administrator's Guide.
Timecard Process (BuyerXpert only)
The BuyerXpert timecard process provides a means for a timecard user (normally a contractor who works for the buyer organization) to electronically submit timecard information for payment approval.Although the timecard process is initiated at the Welcome screen of the BuyerXpert User interface, it is actually outside the buy process altogether, and only uses the following functionality of BuyerXpert:
Create a timecard
There is no ordering process (because nothing has been ordered from a catalog), nor is there a receiving process (because nothing is being received).Approve using the standard BuyerXpert approval process
Timecard Creation
A timecard requisition is created by timecard users after timecard projects and contractor profiles have been set up by the BuyerXpert administrator. For timecard requisitions, the line items that are created by the timecard user are rows of information about the billable hours worked by the timecard user. Data entry fields include project name, type of hours (such as regular, overtime, or holiday), and the quantity of hours worked on each day of the time period, usually a week. The user can provide this information all at once, or enter partial information, then save the timecard requisition and add to it throughout the time period.
Timecard Approval
The approval process (as configured by the BuyerXpert administrator) determines who approves the timecard requisition and in what sequence. At the end of the time period, a timecard user submits the timecard to the BuyerXpert approval process.When a user submits a timecard for approval, BuyerXpert assigns a default accounting code to each line item in the timecard, as set up by the administrator. BuyerXpert calculates the costs of the hours for a line item by multiplying the total number of weekly hours times the rate specified in the timecard project table for the specific project.
Timecard Tracking
After the timecard is submitted for approval (and, thus, formatted into a BuyerXpert requisition), it can be viewed by the timecard user and the approvers using the track option of BuyerXpert. The information the user and the approvers see is different:
Pricing information is not displayed to the timecard user
Approvers see the pricing information and the accounting codes that the line items are being charged to
Example
Shailesh Jones, Senior Consultant, Anderson ConsultingBuyerXpert RegularTime = 30, OverTime = 5, HolidayTime=6, Price = $3000
SellerXpert RegularTime = 10, OverTime = 3, Price = $840
Some_menial_task RegularTime = 3, Price = $180
In this example, the three Price=$ items would not be visible to the timecard creator, but would be visible to the approver.
Timecard Transmission
After approval, timecard requisitions are sent to ECXpert, where they can be mapped to the format of the buyer's legacy system and transmitted to the buyer organization.
Note Refer to the BuyerXpert online Help and the Administrator's Guide for further information on timecards.
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Copyright © 2001 Sun Microsystems, Inc. Some preexisting portions Copyright © 2001 Netscape Communications Corp. All rights reserved.
Last Updated October 03, 2001