How do I manage geography validation?
After defining the geography hierarchy, you need to specify the structure for the country.
You can choose which address style format you would like to use for the country, and for each selected address style format you can map geography types to address attributes. You can also select which geography types to include in address validation or tax validation, and which geography types will display in a list of values during address entry in other user interfaces. The geography validation level for the country, such as error or warning, can also be selected. Geography validation determines the geography mapping and validation for a country's address styles, and the overall address validation control for a country.
The No Styles Format address style format is the default address style format for a country. By defining the mapping and validation for this format you will ensure that validations can be performed for any address in the country. After the No Styles Format is defined you can set up additional mapping for specific address styles.
For each address style format, you can define the following:
-
Map to attribute
-
Enable list of values
-
Tax validation
-
Address validation
-
Address validation control
Attribute Mapping
For every address style format, you can map each geography type to an address attribute. For example, you can map the State geography type to the State address attribute for the United States, or map the State geography type to the County address attribute for the United Kingdom. The geography types that appear are based on how the country structure is defined. The list of address attributes that appear are based on address formats delivered with the application, or your customer defined address formats.
You only need to map geography types that you want to use for address or tax validation purposes.
Enable List of Values
Once a geography type is mapped to an attribute, then you can specify whether the geography type will appear in a list of values during address entry in user interfaces. It is very important to review carefully if you want to enable a list of values. You should only enable a list of values if you have sufficient geography data imported or created for that geography. If the setup for master geography data is incomplete, then the geography data is either not imported or created. As a result, the list of values for the address attribute doesn't list any geography data.
Once you have enabled a list of values for an address attribute, you can only select the geography data available for the geography type. This means that if a specific geography value isn't available in the geography hierarchy, you can't create an address with a different geography value.
Enable List of Values applies to the UI only. It doesn't apply to import, web services, nor REST APIs. For these, all of the required geography types must have a value in the request when creating or updating an address.
Tax Validation
You can also specify whether a geography type will be included in tax validation. For example, for the United States North America address style format you specify that County, State, and City are used for tax validation. This will mean that when a transaction involves an address with the North America address style, the address must have the correct county, state, and city combination based on the geography hierarchy data, to be considered valid for tax calculation.
Address Validation
You must set up address validation for those geography elements that you plan to use in your application. Address validation checks whether geography elements of an address such as state, city, postal code, and soon are valid as per master geography data. Setting up validation also helps ensure that the addresses are correct and deliverable during entry. You can select states or other address elements from lists to ensure accuracy during entry. For example, when you enter a postal code, the application can validate if the postal code exists. Note that address validation isn’t the same as address verification. Address Verification updates and enhances your address. Address verification depends upon Oracle or any third-party address verification services to perform verification.
You can specify whether a geography type will be included in address validation. For example, when the user enters a United States address using the North American address style format, the address must have the correct country, state, and postal code combination based on geography hierarchy data to be considered geographically valid.
If an address element is mapped to a geography type, but not selected for geography validation usage, then during address entry suggested values are provided for the address element, but the address element isn't validated.
You need to verify that the default mapping between Geography Type and Map to Attribute is valid in the Geography Mapping and Validation region and update it if required when you define geography validation.
After setting geography validation, all features that directly and indirectly depend upon geographies are impacted. For example, multiple applications such as ERP, CX, and SCM that use geographies are impacted.
Oracle recommends that you use the following valid mapping for the countries that Loqate supports:
Country Name |
Country Code |
Geography Type |
Map to Attribute |
---|---|---|---|
Andorra |
AD |
|
|
Angola |
AO |
|
|
Argentina |
AR |
|
|
Australia |
AU |
|
|
Austria |
AT |
|
|
Belgium |
BE |
|
|
Bolivia |
BO |
|
|
Bosnia and Herzegovina |
BA |
|
|
Brazil |
BR |
|
|
Bulgaria |
BG |
|
|
Canada |
CA |
|
|
Cayman Islands |
KY |
|
|
Chile |
CL |
|
|
China
Note:
China geography structure is supported but geocoding isn't supported. |
CN |
|
|
Croatia |
HR |
|
|
Cuba |
CU |
|
|
Cyprus |
CY |
|
|
Czech Republic |
CZ |
|
|
Denmark |
DK |
|
|
Dominican Republic |
DO |
|
|
Ecuador |
EC |
|
|
Estonia |
EE |
|
|
Finland |
FI |
|
|
France |
FR |
|
|
Germany |
DE |
|
|
Great Britain |
GB |
|
|
Greece |
GR |
|
|
Guadalupe |
GP |
|
|
Guam |
GU |
|
|
Guernsey |
GG |
|
|
Hungary |
HU |
|
|
Iceland |
IS |
|
|
India |
IN |
|
|
Indonesia |
ID |
|
|
Ireland |
IE |
|
|
Isles of Man |
IM |
|
|
Israel |
IL |
|
|
Italy |
IT |
|
|
Jamaica |
JM |
|
|
Japan |
JP |
|
|
Jordan |
JO |
|
|
Kenya |
KE |
|
|
Latvia |
LV |
|
|
Liechtenstein |
LI |
|
|
Lithuania |
LT |
|
|
Luxembourg |
LU |
|
|
Malaysia |
MY |
|
|
Malta |
MT |
|
|
Martinique |
MQ |
|
|
Mexico |
MX |
|
|
Netherlands |
NL |
|
|
New Zealand |
NZ |
|
|
Norway |
NO |
|
|
Oman |
OM |
|
|
Peru |
PE |
|
|
Poland |
PL |
|
|
Portugal |
PT |
|
|
Puerto Rico |
PR |
|
|
Qatar |
QA |
|
|
Reunion Island |
RE |
|
|
Romania |
RO |
|
|
Russia |
RU |
|
|
San Marino |
SM |
|
|
Singapore |
SG |
|
|
Slovakia |
SK |
|
|
Slovenia |
SI |
|
|
South Africa |
ZA |
|
|
South Korea |
KR |
|
|
Spain |
ES |
|
|
Sri Lanka |
LK |
|
|
Swaziland Note:
This country maybe labeled Eswatini in Manage Territories. |
SZ |
|
|
Sweden |
SE |
|
|
Switzerland |
CH |
|
|
Taiwan |
TW |
|
|
Thailand |
TH |
|
|
Tunisia |
TN |
|
|
Turkey |
TR |
|
|
United Arab Emirates |
AE |
|
|
United States |
US |
|
|
Uruguay |
UY |
|
|
Vatican City |
VA |
|
|
Vietnam |
VN |
|
|
For either the tax or address validation, don't skip any level unless you're certain that the selected geography types can uniquely identify geographies. For example, the United States country structure is: State, County, City, and Postal Code, and you want to select just State and Postal Code for address or tax validation. However, for the combination of California and 94065, the city can be either Redwood Shores or Redwood City. In this case, you should also select at least the City geography type for address or tax validation.
Address Validation Control
You can select the address validation level for a country. Validation will check if the entered address maps to the geography hierarchy data available for the country, and the address validation control determines whether you can save an address that didn't pass validation during address entry. For example, if the validation level is Error, then an address can't be saved if the values don't match the geography hierarchy data.
These are the address validation levels you can choose:
-
Error - only completely valid addresses can be saved, with all mandatory address elements entered.
-
No Validation - all addresses can be saved including incomplete and invalid addresses.
Regardless of the result of validation, the validation process will try to map any address attribute to a geography of the country, and store any mapping it could establish based on the available data. This is called Geography Name Referencing and it's executed as part of validation. The result of this referencing is used in several business processes in the application to map an address to a specific geography or zone. Therefore, Geography Name Referencing is the process of validating and mapping address elements of existing location table records against master reference geographies. For example, CA value in the STATE column of the HZ_LOCATIONS table is mapped to the master reference geography of CA (California).
The Geography Dimension value in territories is derived from sell-to addresses of sales accounts. To use geography dimensions in territories, you must validate the geography elements in the addresses, such as state, city, and postal code. You can validate the address by enabling geography validation for each country using the Manage Geographies task. Perform the following in the Manage Geographies task:
-
Enable at least one level in the geography hierarchy for geography validation.
-
Enable geography validation for all geography levels that you intend to use for territory definition for each country.
-
If needed, enable a list of values containing specific geography elements. This will help users search and select appropriate geography values during addresses entry and eliminate all possibilities of wrong address entry.
You can set geography validation control to Error in the Manage Geography Validation page. This ensures that users can only use valid geography elements in addresses.
If you have already created addresses before setting up address validation for a country, you must enable geography validation and then execute the Validate Geographies of Addresses Against Master Geographies task for that country. This validates all your geography elements.