Shopify EDI Integration for UK Suppliers

Yes, through an EDI provider with a Shopify connector or through a custom link. The buyer’s system sends a purchase order, often as an EANCOM ORDERS message, and it arrives in Shopify as a draft order or an order against that buyer’s company account. The order response, despatch advice and invoice go back the same way. XEDI, a UK provider, lists Shopify and Shopify Plus EDI integration on its own site (read on 29 October 2026).

EDI means electronic data interchange, and in UK retail EDI is how most large buyers send orders. GS1 UK describes it as the automated exchange of business documents, such as purchase orders, invoices and shipping notices, between different computer systems. The standards GS1 UK supports are GS1 EANCOM, GS1 XML, GS1 UN/CEFACT XML Profiles and GS1 EDI Business Terms, and some older links use Tradacoms. Nobody retypes an order from a PDF or an email: the buyer’s system sends it, and yours reads it.

EANCOM is a slimmed-down version of EDIFACT. GS1 describes EANCOM as a GS1 subset of the UN/EDIFACT standard that keeps only the message elements business applications need and the syntax requires. It also uses GS1 identification keys: GTINs for products, GLNs for locations and SSCCs for pallets and cases. The message names stay the same, so an EANCOM purchase order is still an ORDERS message.

Some older trading links may still ask for it. GS1 UK says Tradacoms was developed in the early 1980s for UK retailers and wholesalers, that no new message types have been developed since 1998, and that it stopped supporting Tradacoms from 1 July 2017. It advises new EDI users to adopt EANCOM or GS1 XML wherever possible. We build to whatever your buyer’s guide specifies.

They are two separate rulebooks for the same kind of message. RFC 4130, which defines AS2 for carrying EDI over HTTP, lists the two side by side: ANSI X12 and UN/EDIFACT. X12 numbers its documents, so a purchase order is an 850. EDIFACT names them, so the same order is ORDERS. EANCOM, the main EDI standard GS1 UK supports, is built on EDIFACT. If you also supply US buyers, our US Shopify EDI page covers X12.

EDI is a fixed message format agreed between trading partners, often carried by an EDI provider. An API is a way for one program to ask another for data directly, which is how Shopify, Xero and most ERPs are reached. A Shopify EDI link, like most ecommerce EDI, uses both. The EDIFACT message arrives from the buyer, and the link turns it into Shopify API calls, such as creating a draft order with the buyer’s purchase order number.

The message format and the way it travels are two separate choices. AS2, set out in RFC 4130, sends EDI files over the web with a digital signature, encryption and a signed receipt back. A VAN, or value-added network, is a provider’s mailbox service that passes files between trading partners. SFTP is a secure file drop both sides log in to. Your buyer’s EDI guide names the one it uses.

No UK law requires EDI for ordering. It is a trading requirement: a retailer or distributor writes it into its supplier terms, and you agree to it when you take the account. Invoicing is moving the other way. GOV.UK says mandatory e-invoicing for all VAT invoices is coming from 2029, though not for sales to consumers, and that the technical standards are still to be developed.

They are the GS1 numbers EANCOM uses. A GTIN identifies a product, the number behind its barcode. A GLN identifies a location, such as a retailer’s distribution centre or one of its stores. GS1 UK describes the SSCC as its identifier for shippers and logistics units, used to track a case or pallet. Expect your buyer to order by GTIN, deliver to a GLN and scan an SSCC label at goods-in.

No. GS1 UK says it provides the standards for EDI but does not provide the technology to implement it with your trading partners, and it recommends speaking to a GS1 UK partner early on. It does give members free access to its GS1 Print service to generate SSCCs and logistics labels. The connection itself comes from an EDI provider, a custom link, or both.

A despatch advice, the DESADV message in the UN/EDIFACT directory, tells the buyer what is on its way before it arrives: which order, which products, how many, packed in which cases or on which pallets. Each case or pallet carries an SSCC label. The buyer’s goods-in team scans the label and looks for the same SSCC in the despatch advice. If the two disagree, the delivery has to be checked by hand.

The same content a paper VAT invoice needs, in the buyer’s message format. GOV.UK says VAT invoices must include your VAT number and show the VAT separately. HMRC’s Making Tax Digital notice says the digital record of each supply holds the time of supply, the value before VAT and the VAT rate. The INVOIC message carries those per line. Your accountant confirms the rates, and the link applies them.

It makes the invoice side of EDI the normal way to bill business customers. The government’s consultation response says all VAT invoices must be e-invoices from 2029, that it has focused on a decentralised model, and that it will develop standards for interoperability. It names EDIFACT among the formats in use today. Until the standard is published, we build invoices so the output format can change without rebuilding the order rules.

Data moved by software counts. VAT Notice 700/22 lists API transfer, automated data transfer, and XML or CSV import and export among accepted digital links. It says HMRC does not count copy and paste as a digital link, and that moving data between programs by hand is not acceptable. A link that moves orders and invoices between the EDI provider, Shopify and Xero or Sage by API stays on the accepted list.

Usually a draft order, so a person can check it before it becomes a confirmed order. Shopify’s DraftOrderInput accepts a purchase order number, payment terms, a purchasing entity for the buying company, and a time after which reserved stock is released. That covers what an ORDERS message brings. You choose per trading partner whether orders stop as drafts or go straight through.

Shopify’s help centre says Shopify B2B is available on the Basic, Grow, Advanced and Shopify Plus plans, and not on Starter or Retail. B2B customers are set up as companies in the Shopify admin, each with its own pricing, currency, products, payment and shipping methods. An EDI order is posted against the right company, so it picks up that buyer’s prices and terms. Read on 29 October 2026.

For the common ones, yes. Shopify’s B2B help page lists net 7, 15, 30, 45, 60 and 90 days, counted from the order date, plus due on fulfilment, for company locations and draft orders. A fixed calendar date is available on individual draft orders only. If a buyer pays on terms Shopify does not list, such as end of month following, the due date is worked out in your accounts system instead.

Yes. The order can go to Shopify, and the invoice and stock movement to Xero, Sage 50, Sage 200, Sage Intacct, QuickBooks, NetSuite, Dynamics 365 Business Central or Odoo. Warehouse systems such as Linnworks, Mintsoft or Brightpearl can sit in the chain too. The first job is naming one master for orders and one for stock, so goods come off the shelf once and the invoice is raised once.

The link has to notice and catch up. A webhook is the alert Shopify sends when something changes, such as a new fulfilment. Shopify’s developer documentation says webhook delivery is not always guaranteed, that ordering is not guaranteed, and that an app should not rely on webhooks alone. It recommends reconciliation jobs: scheduled checks that fetch data from Shopify and compare it. We build one into every EDI link, so a missing notification does not leave a despatch advice or an invoice unsent.

Yes, where the buyer asks for it. Shopify’s fulfillmentCreate mutation marks items as fulfilled and accepts tracking information. When your warehouse books a parcel with Royal Mail, DPD or Evri and records the tracking number on the Shopify fulfilment, the link can add it to the despatch advice. Pallet deliveries to a distribution centre rely on SSCC labels instead.

The EDI provider and the build are priced separately. On 29 October 2026, XEDI, a UK provider, listed web-portal plans at £128, £256 and £348 per trading partner a month, plus usage. Its comparison table ticks Shopify integration only on Enterprise, which is custom-priced. We found no published GBP build range from a named UK agency. FactoryJet quotes the build as a fixed price per phase, in writing, after a short scoping call.

It depends on four steps, and three are not ours. Your team supplies the GTIN for each product and the GLN for each delivery point. Your EDI provider sets up the mailbox for each buyer. We build and show the link on your own data. Then the buyer runs its own test cycle and decides when you go live. The written quote sets our part against the go-live date your buyer gave you.

Yes. Before a contract, we show working software on your own data. For an EDI job that means a sample ORDERS message from your buyer’s guide arriving as a draft order in a test Shopify store, against the right company and prices, with the order response, despatch advice and invoice it would send back laid out for you to check.

You own the code and the repository from day one. Hosting can run in your own accounts, at cost, with no markup. Defects are fixed inside the build price for a cover period agreed before work starts. Support is optional. The build is a fixed price per phase, quoted in writing. Each change is quoted and approved per request, and there is no monthly minimum.

Yes. If you already trade through an EDI provider, we build on it rather than move you. Your provider keeps carrying messages to and from buyers, and your warehouse or 3PL (the outside logistics firm that stores and ships your stock) keeps packing orders. We build what joins them: Shopify, your accounts and your stock system each receiving and sending what the buyer’s guide asks for.