We would love to, but it has to go through our system
A university's procurement team likes your marketplace: wide range, good suppliers, one account. But their staff can only buy through the university's procurement system, which raises purchase orders and matches supplier invoices against them. If the marketplace is not connected, staff cannot use it without breaking policy. They ask whether you support punchout. Your team is not sure what that means.
Hospital trusts, local authorities, large contractors and facilities companies ask the same question in slightly different words.
Why large buyers need an integration
Big organisations control spending through procurement systems, sometimes called eProcurement or purchase-to-pay systems. Staff browse approved suppliers, build a basket, and the system raises a PO that goes through approval. Invoices must match the PO before they are paid. A marketplace that sits outside this process is, from their point of view, unmanaged spend.
Punchout is the common way around it: the buyer's user clicks through from their procurement system to your marketplace, shops as normal, and the basket is sent back into their system as a requisition. The PO then comes to you electronically, and your invoice goes back in a format their system can match.
| Integration piece | What it does |
|---|---|
| Punchout session | User jumps from their system to your marketplace, logged in |
| Basket return | Basket sent back to their system as a requisition |
| PO intake | Approved PO sent to you electronically |
| Order confirmation and ship notices | Status sent back to their system |
| Invoice return | Invoice sent in a format their system matches to the PO |
What not having it costs
Large buyers bring large, steady volumes, and many of them simply cannot buy without an integration. Staff who use the marketplace anyway, on a card, create problems for their own finance team that come back to you. Orders placed by email and re-keyed are slow and error-prone. And competitors who offer punchout win the framework or preferred supplier status you were hoping for.
It is also a question of scale. A single procurement integration can open the marketplace to hundreds of staff in one buyer organisation.
The procurement integration we build
- Protocol support: punchout and order messages in the formats the buyer's system uses, most commonly cXML, and OCI for some SAP-based systems, built once and configured per buyer.
- Buyer-specific session: users arriving through punchout see the buyer's contract prices, approved categories and delivery sites, based on their company account.
- Basket return: the basket is sent back with the product codes, descriptions, units, prices and classification codes the buyer's system expects, such as UNSPSC where required.
- PO intake: approved POs arrive electronically, are validated against the returned basket, and become marketplace orders split to suppliers, with the PO number carried on every document.
- Status and invoices: order confirmations, dispatch notices and invoices are returned in the buyer's format, so their system can match them to the PO.
- Onboarding tooling: each new buyer integration is set up and tested with the buyer's procurement team using a checklist and test environment.
Some buyers use procurement networks that sit between the buyer and the supplier. We work with the network's requirements where that applies.
When a large buyer is connected
Staff across the buyer's organisation shop on your marketplace from their usual procurement screen. Orders arrive as approved POs, not emails. Invoices match first time, so payment follows the buyer's normal process. Your team can say yes when the next procurement team asks about punchout, and can show them how it works.
Are large buyers asking for this?
- Buyers have asked whether you support punchout or cXML.
- Public sector or corporate buyers cannot use the marketplace under their policy.
- Large buyers email POs that your team re-keys.
- Invoices are rejected by buyers' systems for not matching the PO.
- Competitors win preferred supplier status because they are integrated.