Contract Syndication

When you syndicate a contract, you publish the contract from a parent system (PeopleSoft) to another single or multiple third-party systems (remote systems). After syndication, the contract is available on the remote system from which remote users can create purchase orders and process receipts, vouchers, and returns to vendors.

The publishing process is achieved through PeopleSoft Integration Broker outbound message processing for the entire contract or for certain changes to the contract, such as new contract lines. After receiving the syndicated contract or its changes, remote users can create purchase orders or perform other actions using the syndicated contract.

Note:

Messages created in PeopleTools do not contain processing logic. All processing logic is defined using handlers. Handlers are specified in service operation definitions. Messages describe the contents of a service operation transaction. The use of the message term in the Syndication process refers to the process of sending and receiving messages.

When the third-party system has the capability, its users can send certain updates back to the parent system so that you have an aggregate view of activity using the parent system. The Syndication feature makes it possible to share contracts by using a framework that enables contract execution processing in remote systems with overall contract management and performance tracking taking place in the PeopleSoft Purchasing application that resides on the parent system.

The Syndication feature in Supplier Contract Management facilitates the exchange of contract information between systems so that remote systems can use the centralized parent system's contract pricing information. Using this contract-sharing feature, you have the framework for managing contracts in disparate systems as the overall contract management and performance tracking takes place in the PeopleSoft system.

Using the Syndication feature, you can:

  • Define and publish current contract information from Purchasing contracts to remote systems.

  • Receive and consolidate contract-related activity from remote systems.

  • Create a contract in Purchasing (contract import) from another system.

    This is a general inbound contract message for the PeopleSoft system and is not specific to the Syndication process.

    See the Review Inbound Contract Exceptions Page.

    Note:

    These topic describe the process for using the PeopleSoft system with third-party systems. It's assumed that remote systems use inbound and outbound message publishing programs that are compatible with PeopleSoft publishing programs. This means that any related setup data, such as suppliers, items, or units of measure, on the remote system supports the inbound contract message. Supplier Contract Management syndication syndicates only contract information and not the setup information.

You can syndicate contracts from either the contract component, or schedule the syndication using batch processing. When syndicating a contract, the system initially publishes the entire contract. For subsequent syndications, you can either publish contract changes or republish the entire contract.

This diagram describes the syndication flow of a contract between parent and remote or child systems:

Syndication flow

You maintain the syndicated contract using the PeopleSoft parent system, but you can use remote systems to release purchase orders, receipts, and vouchers against the contract. You can set up service operations and routings to process these activities which are sent back to the parent system.

For additional information about setting up the parent system, see .Setup Requirements

Parent System

Using Syndication features on the parent PeopleSoft system, you can:

  • Define contracts for syndication.

  • Create a contract in PeopleSoft Purchasing by importing contract information from another system.

  • Publish current versions of Purchasing contracts to remote systems.

  • Receive and consolidate contract activity published from remote systems.

  • Review summary and contract-line released details in the parent system.

Remote System

Using Integration Broker publishing programs on the remote system, the system receives the outbound messages from the PeopleSoft parent system. Using the remote system enables third-party systems to:

  • Process the inbound PeopleSoft parent contract and pricing as a syndicated contract.

    You can make limited changes on the remote system, and you receive warnings that changes may be overwritten. For Integration Broker purposes, the system considers the PeopleSoft contract as a master contract as opposed to the contracts on the remote systems.

  • Enter purchase orders against the syndicated contract that can have pricing information.

  • Process releases, payments, and accounts payable activities against the contract using the remote system.

  • Publish contract transaction activities back to the PeopleSoft parent system.

    Note:

    The remote system must support processing an inbound PeopleSoft contract as well as publish outbound contract transaction activity back to the PeopleSoft parent system in PeopleSoft's XML format. PeopleSoft does not deliver translations for inbound and outbound messaging for the remote system.

    See Contract Syndication Enterprise Integration Points.