This chapter describes setup tasks that you must perform in Oracle iStore that are specific to the Oracle Telecommunications Service Ordering (TSO) solution.
Before implementing Oracle iStore, you must set up the core applications for the Oracle TSO solution. For details, refer to the chapter, Implementing the Oracle TSO Solution.
Note: For Oracle Quoting integration, customer service representatives (sales agents) should only publish TSO quotes that are small enough to be handled via Oracle iStore. Since all TSO configurations are expanded in the cart, large configurations will not perform well, creating usability issues.
Following is the setup checklist for implementing TSO-specific functionality for Oracle iStore.
| Setup Step | Required/Optional |
|---|---|
| Implement Oracle iStore | Required |
| Set Up Payment Due with Order and Recurring Charges | Required |
| Set Profile Options | Required |
| Set Up Items | Required |
| Perform Pricing and Payment Setups | Required |
| Perform User Setups | Required |
Payment Due with Order functionality allows implementers to display one-time (total net price) and recurring charges in the shopping cart and order review pages. For an example of how Payment Due with Order and recurring charges display in the Oracle iStore Customer Application shopping cart, Review Changes page, and Order Tracker, see the "Display of Totals Area", section in the chapter, Using the Oracle TSO Solution.
Every line in the shopping cart will be associated with one charge, either recurring (pay later amount) or one-time (pay now or pay later amount). For a given line, the system checks the periodicity of the item. If the periodicity is null, it means that the line does not have any recurring charges. If the periodicity is not null, then the recurring charge of the line is displayed in the appropriate column along with its periodicity.
In the Amount Due with Order area, the Sub-Total amount is calculated by an Oracle Receivables API and cannot be changed by the user. The Total Due With Order includes taxes and shipping/handling (unless setup is done to not show these). Only one payment method can be captured at the header level, and this payment method is used for the Payment Due with Order amount. The recommended payment instrument for pay now is credit card (since it allows authorization); however, this is not enforced in the code. Recurring charges lines should have pay later payment terms; otherwise, the pay now portion of these charges will be included in the Total Due Now amount.
Recurring items display as prices having a periodicity (e.g., Monthly, Quarterly, etc.). These items must belong to a network container. Assuming they are set up, recurring prices only display if the profile option, IBE: Enable Recurring Charges, is Yes. For each period, a sum of all charges is provided. Totals are displayed dynamically based on the items in the cart (e.g,. if there are no quarterly items, a quarterly total is not displayed).
Note: When setting up recurring charges, the value entered for each period is the value that displays in the shopping cart. Therefore, ensure that the word is entered in adjective form. For example, the period type Month should be entered as Monthly in order to display thusly in the shopping cart.
See "Set Profile Options", below, for more information on setting profile options to enable Payment Due with Order and recurring charges.
Set the profile options in this section according to your business requirements.
This profile option specifies whether option classes are displayed in the Oracle iStore shopping cart, Order Tracker, and e-mail notifications. Set to Yes to enable the display. If set to No, option class children are displayed as direct children of the option class parent. Possible values: Yes/No. Default value: Null. If Yes or Null, option classes are displayed. This profile can be set at application, site, and responsibility levels.
This profile option controls the appearance of the My Products subtab in Order Tracker in the Oracle iStore Customer Application. Set to Yes to enable the subtab. Possible values: Yes/No. Default value: No. See the Oracle iStore Implementation and Administration Guide (Implementing Carts and Orders chapter) for more information on the My Products page.
The profile option, IBE: Enable Pay Now, specifies whether Pay Now/Pay Later totals are displayed in the in the Oracle iStore Customer Application shopping cart and in the order review page. Set to Yes to enable the display of Pay Now/Pay Later totals. Possible values: Yes/No. Default value: No. This profile option can be set at application, site and responsibility levels. This profile option should be set to Yes only if the OM system parameter, Installment Options, is set to Enable Pay Now.
The profile option, IBE: Enable Recurring Charges, specifies whether recurring charges are displayed in the Oracle iStore Customer Application shopping cart and in the order review page. Set to Yes to enable the display. Possible values: Yes/No. Default value: No. This profile option can be set at application, site and responsibility levels. This profile option should be to Yes only if the Order Management Recurring Charge system parameter is set to Yes.
If IBE: Enable Recurring Charges is Yes, the shopping cart amount is removed from the Welcome Bin, regardless of the items present in the cart.
Note: Note that the amount to be authorized is not controlled by these iStore profiles; these profiles only control the Oracle iStore user interface. The authorized amount is be based on OM system parameter, Installment Options.
In the case where IBE: Enable Pay Now is Yes and IBE: Enable Recurring Charges is No, the following will be displayed:
Subtotal
Shipping and handling
Tax
Total
Amount Due With Order:
Subtotal
Shipping and handling
Tax
Total Due with Order
In an implementation where both TSO and non-TSO sites are set up, specific guidelines exist about the settings of the profile options, IBE: Enable Pay Now and IBE: Enable Recurring Charges.
Case 1: One site has both TSO and non-TSO stores
The profile options should be disabled at site and application levels.
The profile options should be enabled at responsibility level for the TSO stores only.
Case 2: One site contains only TSO stores
In this case, the profile options should be set up at site level.
Case 3: One site contains only non-TSO stores
In this case, the profile options should be disabled at all levels.
IBE: Autoquery Install Base for B2C Users specifies whether an autoquery is performed when a B2C customer accesses the My Products tab in the Oracle iStore Customer Application Order Tracker. Set to No to enable search criteria in the UI; set to Yes to disable search criteria. For B2B users, the search criteria is always present; this profile option has no effect on B2B functionality. Possible values: Yes/No. Default value: Yes. This profile can be set at site, application, and responsibility levels.
IBE: View Only Web Published Items in Install Base specifies whether only Web Published items are visible in the install base view in the My Products subtab in in the Oracle iStore Customer Application Order Tracker. Possible values: Yes/No. Default value: No. This profile can be set at application, site, and responsibility levels.
See the Oracle iStore Implementation and Administration Guide (Implementing Carts and Orders chapter) for more information on the My Products page.
Oracle iStore first checks the payment terms defined at item level, then, if it doesn't find an item-level payment term, it uses the profile option, IBE: Default Payment Term, to set the terms of the item. This profile option must be set to a proper value in conjunction with item-level payment terms. As a best practice, set this profile option to a Payment Due with Order payment term and then enable a Pay Later payment term at item level for each recurring charge. Alternatively, set this profile option to a Pay Later payment term, and then enable Payment Due with Order payment terms at item level for each Payment Due with Order item.
When a customer configures a Container Model from the catalog in the Oracle iStore Customer Application, the usage set for the Model by the iStore Administrator in the iStore Administration UI is passed to Oracle Configurator. However, there may be times when a customer views the item in the shopping cart and clicks it to view the Item Details page. In this case, if the customer configures the item from the Item Details page, there is no longer a section context associated with the Model, and the usage will not be passed to Oracle Configurator. As a workaround for this potential issue, implementers can set the profile option, CZ: Publication Usage, at iStore application level to a valid usage (e.g., PHONE_FLOW or PLAN_FLOW) as stored in Configurator. Setting this profile will cause Oracle Configurator to pick up the usage of any Model (configured in the specific case noted here) from the profile option.
In a TSO implementation, the profile options, MO: Operating Unit and IBE: Item Validation Organization, must be in sync at the responsibility level of the responsibility associated to the TSO specialty sites.
Once the dependencies and profiles are set up, perform the setups in this section to set up the items for purchase through the Oracle iStore Customer Application:
Ensure that your items are set up properly in Oracle Inventory, according to the following guidelines:
Assign periodicity to recurring items so that they can be priced accordingly. Existing items have a null periodicity by default. The periodicity of the item can be set either in Oracle Advanced Product Catalog or in Oracle Inventory.
Note: Each item should only have one periodicity. The periodicity of an item should not be changed if a transaction exists for this item.
For each item in a network container, set up item-level payment terms (item specific) in Oracle Inventory. This is done by selecting the payment term for each item in the Payment Terms LOV within the Master Items Invoicing tab.
To be included in the amount to authorize in Payment Due with Order functionality, items must have their Invoiceable Item and Invoice Enabled flags enabled.
Children of a configuration should not have their Inventory Web Orderable flags enabled, since they cannot be ordered standalone. The Web Orderable flag enables the Add to Cart button in the item details page of the Oracle iStore Customer Application. Such items also should be marked as Web Published so that they are retrieved by the search results in the Customer Application.
Items that are not part of a network container, but which are associated with a periodicity, are not supported. Only children of a container should be associated with a periodicity.
Payment Due with Order functionality is only supported for one-time lines. Recurring charges lines should have Pay Later payment terms; otherwise, the pay now portion of these charges will be included in the Total Due Now amount.
A network container should not have any periodicity under the Order Management tab (and Payment Terms under Invoicing Tab) assigned to it.
For more information, see the chapters, Set Up Oracle Order Management, and Set Up Oracle Inventory and the Item Master.
As a best practice, set up a node in the section hierarchy just for the TSO items. In Oracle iStore, create navigational sections as follows:
Parent section: Wireless Services; note that this can be a child of another section. For this section, assign the Display Template, Subsection List with Product Detail.
Child section of Wireless Services: Start with Phone
Child section of Wireless Services: Start with Plan
For both of the child sections (Start with Phone and Start with Plan) you may either leave the default Display Template (Product Detail) set or assign a different one, depending upon your business requirements. Note that all of these sections should be navigational sections.
Using the Sections or Products pages, add the network container item to the two child sections (Start with Phone and Start with Plan) with the appropriate usages. For example, for the Start with Phone section, add the network container to it and assign the product the Start with Phone usage.
See the Oracle iStore Implementation and Administration Guide (Implementing Products chapter) for more information on item setup.
In addition to setting up recurring prices in Oracle Advanced Pricing and Payment Due with Order functionality, perform the following pricing and payment setups:
In the Oracle iStore Site Administration Application, assign price lists to the sites containing the TSO items.
In the Oracle iStore Site Administration Application, assign credit card as a payment type to the sites containing the TSO items.
Note: In a reconfiguration flow, if Credit Card is not available as a payment type on the site, the credit card will not get defaulted into the order, even if the original order was placed using Credit Card as the payment type. In this case, another payment type will be defaulted onto the order.
Perform the following user setups for Oracle iStore.
For B2B users only, TSO functionality is supported for users with the IBE_VIEW_NET_PRICE permission in their user role. B2C users do not have the concept of user permissions. If an Oracle iStore B2B user does not have the IBE_VIEW_NET_PRICE permission, only list prices are displayed -- and since in a TSO scenario there is no concept of a list pay now total -- users without this permission will not be able to see the proper prices.
Customers who have already placed on order through a different channel than Oracle iStore and thus have a pre-existing relationship with your company can register to use Oracle iStore. This type of registration is known as Online Access to Existing Account. In addition to providing customers a quick and convenient way to access your online stores, by integrating directly into Oracle TCA customer database, it also helps to avoid the creation of unnecessary, duplicate accounts. The registration is accomplished by using existing Oracle Trading Community Architecture and/or Oracle Internet Directory (OID) user data and allowing the user to fill in the remaining necessary data. If no order has been placed by or for the user, the user will have to register as if he is a new customer, even if some data already exists for this customer.
Online Access to Existing Account functionality is supported for both B2C and B2B users. See the Oracle iStore Implementation and Administration Guide (Implementing User Management chapter) for more information.