Order Details on B2B eCommerce Sites

Getting the Details Right

eCommerce orders can be very simple, but B2B ordering at the enterprise level has nuances that are very specific to each customer and its workflows. This is especially true as businesses scale up and become more complex. Even orders that appear simple on the surface can become quite complicated when a customer has specific demands. Examples of these needs include: 

• Split-payments 
• Split-shipping 
• Hard- and soft- stops 
• Customer-specific pricing 
• Quantity-based price breaks 
• Price rules 
• Preferred-customer discounts 
• Detailed logic regarding inventory 
• Warehouse or distribution center fulfillment logic 
• Omnichannel ordering to single locations 
• Marketplace orders (multiple vendors, buying groups)   

No matter how complex each of these may get, one thing is certain: The order history in the order summary needs to be simple and easy to use while still remaining powerful enough for customers to complete the tasks they need for their own business workflow. 

When it comes to enterprise eCommerce orders on B2B eCommerce platforms, Clarity often starts with a grid that shows the chronological listing of orders. This can be presented in the grid view or list view, and it can be searchable and filterable so the user can look for specific text within the line items of the order. 

For example, your customer can search for specific date ranges or order status, and they can sort and filter based on different additional concepts that might be specific to the business. This could include custom fields or very specific nuances related to the enterprise eCommerce process that your operation needs to run. 

From a list view or grid view, it's possible for the user to drill down and see details. In that list view or detail view, the B2B ordering system can present a hierarchical structure if an order is split or if the order has different fulfillment. This could occur if an order is going to a single location with a single payment, but the timeline may be split out because a portion of the order was filled immediately and then another portion is filled later based on inventory and lead time. 

Therefore, it is possible to show not just the overall order, but a drill down so that the user can see which parts of the order have been completed and which parts of the order is still pending. The user can then click into any part of an order so, if an order to split out, they can click into a split portion of the order or the primary overall master order. You could think of it as an order that is split into a master primary order and then suborders that are grouped into the primary order. 

All of these have detail views. The detail view is where many of the specific functionality and advanced capabilities live. This can be accessed from the user dashboard, or it could also be from a status email or some other interaction such as a chat with the vendor where the vendor is referencing a specific order.

The order details themselves include standard fields and can be highly customized. The most common fields include shipping and billing information, status of the order, and tracking details. This can continue with a chronological listing of events related to that particular suborder or overall order. This would include details such as:  

• when the order was placed  
• when the order began fulfillment  
• when the order was fulfilled  
• when the order was ready for shipment  
• tracking information 
• when the order was actually shipped 
• when the order was delivered, and to whom

This information must be very granular, because some of Clarity’s clients offer intermodal shipping that includes multiple steps that go beyond traditional B2C or C2C eCommerce. This can include a graphical presentation of different steps in the intermodal process as well as all available tracking information and details from the different carriers that can be provided to the user through the order details. We can also visually present the data for split orders; this would include B2B ordering that includes split shipping and orders that, in the fulfillment process, are split into multiple physical shipments.  

Present Information in Multiple Ways 

In addition, every order shows the line items, which often include the image of the item itself, a title, a brief summary, a link to the product itself, the price that was paid, and any discounts. The overall order has a subtotal and then details around taxes. The taxes can be presented on an overall order basis or on a line-item basis, sometimes based on the category of the line item. There can also be specific taxes or types of taxes based on the region or country where the taxes are applied, any customs and duties, and freight or handling fees. This all brings it to the final total. 

Many B2B orders go through multiple steps, including the quote, then a sales order, then an invoice. We show them in the sales order view so the user can jump between quote sales order or sales order and invoice, and it can be quite convenient for the user so they can see some of the historical data of what happened with the order from beginning to end. We associate all of those records, so it's very easy for users to see the entire flow from a quote to a sales order to an invoice, and they can click in and see the historical detail.