Vinculum

Introduction

Vinculum is an aggregator platform that facilitates the flow of inventory and order data from your selling locations (stores). It helps the merchants selling on different sales channels to use it as a standalone platform for managing orders and inventory instead of individually managing the data on Flipkart Seller Hub, Amazon Seller Central, etc.

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Once you have installed this extension, it will be available in the Extensions section on Fynd Platform.

How To Use Vinculum Extension

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To accept and update your inventory using Vinculum, use below configurations.

• Inventory
• Selling Location
• Order Logs
• Audit Trail
• Settings

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Inventory

Inventory Summary

• Within the inventory summary, we collect various API calls for inventory in batches.

• Here you can access a comprehensive inventory log along with seller identifier, location code, status, response, total inventory count of products sent to the Fynd Platform by Vinculum, and the total inventory count of products accepted by the Fynd Platform from Vinculum after incorporating buffer quantities.

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The seller identifier and location code in these logs are distinct, ensuring there are no duplicates for these two entities.

Figure 1: Inventory Summary

• By default, all logs received for a specific company with a unique seller identifier and unique location code are accessible within the tab.

• You can utilize the search boxes located at the top to find logs associated with a particular seller identifier or a specific location code. Input your search criteria, and the relevant logs will be filtered accordingly.

• The listed drop reasons are retrieved directly from the API calls.

Figure 2: Inventory Summary Search

Inventory

• By default, all logs received for a specific company with a unique seller identifier and unique location code are accessible within the tab.

• You can utilize the search boxes located at the top to find logs associated with a particular seller identifier or a specific location code. Input your search criteria, and the relevant logs will be filtered accordingly.

• The listed drop reasons are retrieved directly from the API calls.

1. Seller Identifier - It is a unique identifier or code assigned to a specific seller.
2. Location Code - It is a unique identifier or code for a specific selling location.
3. Quantity - Live inventory in Fynd Platform.
4. Updated on - Orders received on Fynd Platform for an SKU.

Figure 3: Inventory

The date filter allows you to track inventory updates for up to one year.

Logs

When an API call is made, the acknowledgement or confirmation of the execution is typically sent back in the form of a request ID. This unique identifier helps track and verify the specific log of API calls of a specific batch received and processed by the server.

Payload

Request Body

• location_id is the location code.
• sku is the alphanumeric code assigned to each product for inventory tracking and management
• quantity is the quantity of the product for cataloguing.

Figure 4: Request Body of Payload

Detailed Log

In the detailed log, the payload contains all the data mapped for cataloguing purposes. This data is transferred from the Article Database (Article DB), which holds the raw master data, to the Fynd Platform.

Request Body

store_id The store ID gets created on the Fynd Platform.

seller_identifier The unique identifier of product which is the barcode in the article DB.

total_quantity The total count of inventory available.

price_effective The effective selling price .i.e. price after discount deducted from MRP.

price_marked Maximum retail price of the product.

company_id The unique code of the company.

buffer_message The buffer message if they have applied any buffer quantity against it.

trace_id It is the trace ID that is generated in the response to track the request batch received from Vinculum.

store_code Store code created on the Fynd Platform. It is different from store ID.

raw_quantity Raw quantity of the products.

Figure 5: Request Body of Detailed Log

Manual Sync

The operation is utilized when there is an issue with inventory synchronization. If inventory sync is successfully received from Vinculum but is not reflected in Fynd Platform, you can manually trigger the synchronization to align the two systems in quantity.

Use this functionality after applying buffer so that inventory flows to Fynd Platform after subtracting buffer quantity. Once the sync is completed, the changes will reflect on your opted sales channels. You can sync inventory manually to Fynd Platform by using:

1. Seller Identifier: This will sync the inventory for all SKUs or manually selected SKUs present across all selling locations.
   • All seller identifiers within a specific date range
   • Comma–separated multiple seller identifiers within a specific date range

Figure 6: Manual Sync — Seller Identifier

2. Location Code: This will sync the inventory for all SKUs present in these selling locations.
   • All active location codes within a specific date range
   • Comma–separated multiple location codes within a specific date range

Figure 7: Manual Sync — Location Code

Inventory Timeline

• Enter a seller identifier in the search box, select the location code, select the status of the API call and enter a date range.

• Click Get Logs. Here, you will get the status of inventory updates of a product for up to a month.

• This tab lets you know whether an article’s inventory push was successful or not.

• Failure reasons could be: article not available, store mapping not found, discovered duplicate batch record, SKU missing for a store, location not available, and so on.

Figure 8: Inventory Timeline

Inventory Statistics

• The total inventory count of products from the master catalog entries that are accessed in the article DB is mirrored in the received inventory.

• The total inventory count of products that are synced on the Fynd Platform from the article database.

• The percentage drop represents the decrease in the inventory count, showing the difference between the received inventory and the consumed inventory.

Figure 9: Inventory Timeline

Drop Reasons

The drop percentage is attributed to specific reasons, which are detailed in the drop reason section. There are four main reasons for inventory consumption decrease from the Article Database to the Fynd Platform:

1. Location mapping not found
2. Store not found
3. Seller identifier not found
4. Buffer These reasons are visually represented and specified in the form of a pie chart, making it easy to grasp the distribution of inventory drops due to each of these factors.

Figure 9: Inventory Timeline

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Selling Location

All the locations present in the section are reflected in the Profile section. Opt-in selling locations to send inventory updates and process orders via the Vinculum panel. Use bulk action to opt-in multiple selling locations at once.

How to opt-in for a selling location?

1. Open Selling Location widget present on the homepage of this extension.

Figure 10: Selling Location

2. Search for a particular location by entering its Location Code in the search box. For example, MRVLB20 which is a location code for 'THE MANDHANA RETAIL VENTURES LTD' in the Fynd Platform.
3. Click the Edit button present under the Action column.
4. Turn ON the toggle to start sending inventory and receiving orders for this location (push inventory data and pull orders data).

Figure 11: Enable Selling Location

5. Disable the location and reset its inventory count to zero by toggling the status button.

   

   Figure 12: Disable Selling Location
   

6. You can also set a buffer on a selling location, which will be applied to all articles mapped to that selling location.

   

   Figure 13: Buffer Quantity
   

7. Click Confirm to save the changes.

8. On successful opt-in, a unique username and token will be generated for that selling location, which has to be used to send inventory to Fynd Platform and receive order updates from Fynd Platform.

   

   Figure 14: Username and Token for Selling Location
   

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After opting out of a selling location, you must wait for at least 10 minutes before re-opting into the same selling location.

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Click Set Buffer to set a global buffer for all selling locations. This buffer will be applied to all active and inactive selling locations.

How to opt-in selling locations in bulk?

1. Click Bulk Action.

   

   Figure 15: Bulk Action
   

2. Choose the status of locations from the dropdown. Here, we have selected** All Locations**.

3. Choose either EXCEL or CSV from the Download dropdown. A file will be downloaded.

   

   Figure 16: Download Template
   

4. Save the file in your system.

5. Open the file.

6. Make the following changes in the downloaded file.

   • Opt-in selling locations by marking Status as ACTIVE.

   • Opt-out of selling locations by marking Status as INACTIVE.

   • Set Buffer Quantity for multiple selling locations.

   • Reset inventory to 0 for any location you marked as Active/Inactive by marking the Reset Inventory column as Yes.

     

     Figure 17: Bulk Action Template
     

7. Save the file.

8. Click Choose File to upload the saved file. Please wait until its status changes to COMPLETED

9. In this way, you can opt-in selling locations in bulk.

   

   Figure 18: Bulk File Upload
   

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If there are errors in uploading the file, there will be an error file which will be generated. Download the error file, fix the errors mentioned, and re-upload the file.

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After applying buffer to any selling location:
you need to manually sync inventory for that specific location or all locations for the updated inventory (Inventory received from Vinculum–Buffer Quantity) to be pushed to the Fynd Platform.
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the updated inventory (Inventory received from Vinculum–Buffer Quantity) will be pushed to Fynd Platform automatically upon receiving new inventory updates from Vinculum.

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Order Logs

This feature in the Vinculum extension maintains a detailed record of all the order-related operations performed by the seller on Vinculum panel.

Figure 19: Order Logs

Figure 20: Order Logs

This includes a wide range of activities such as polling, confirming, cancelling, packing, dispatching orders, managing invoice details, getting courier information, as well as generating label and invoice pdfs.

By using the Order Logs, the seller can quickly and easily gain an overview of recent interactions and their corresponding statuses.

To ensure accurate tracking of each activity, a unique request ID is assigned, and the panel displays all relevant request details, including the request URL, parameters, and responses.

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Audit Trail

• Audit Trail tracks all the actions performed by the user in the Vinculum extension.

• It helps you pinpoint the exact source of a problem in case someone does something unexpected within the extension.

• List of events that get captured:

  • Catalog Sync
  • Disable Inventory Permission
  • Disable Order Permission
  • Enable Inventory Permission
  • Enable Order Permission
  • Event Action Edit
  • Event Status Update
  • Extension Disable
  • Extension Enable
  • Extension Install
  • Extension Uninstall
  • Inventory Batch Retry
  • Inventory Manual Sync
  • Location Edit
  • Store Sync

  

  Figure 21: Audit Trail
  

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Settings

Manually sync your catalog and selling locations from Fynd Platform to Vinculum, and customise your Order and Inventory permissions as well as enable or disable this extension according to your preferences.

Figure 22: General Settings

Activating/Deactivating Vinculum Extension

Upon deactivating this extension,

• You will get a popup asking if you want to reset the inventory of all active selling locations to 0 in Fynd Platform
  1. If you select the checkbox, inventory for all articles mapped to the selling locations will be reset to 0 in Fynd Platform
  2. If you deselect the checkbox, the current existing inventory will be retained.
• No tabs and functionalities will be accessible. Only the Settings widget will be enabled so that you can re-enable the extension.
• Inventory flow from Vinculum to Fynd Platform and orders syncing from Fynd Platform to Vinculum will be stopped.

Figure 23: Disable Extension

Manually Sync catalog and Selling Locations

Click Sync to manually sync the catalog and selling locations data present in the Fynd Platform to the Vinculum extension. When catalog or location sync jobs are in progress, the extension will not be usable.

Figure 24: Manually Sync catalog and Selling Locations

Enable/Disable Inventory and Order Permissions

Both order and inventory permissions will be enabled by default if the extension is enabled. Inventory - If you remove the permissions for inventory, the inventory flow from Vinculum to Fynd Platform will be stopped.

• If you select the reset Inventory checkbox, the inventory will be reset in Fynd Platform and you will stop receiving new orders.
• If you do not select the reset Inventory checkbox, the inventory will stay as it is in the Fynd Platform and the seller will continue receiving orders.

Orders - Removing the permissions for orders, it will stop the flow of orders from Fynd Platform to Vinculum. If there is inventory present in the Fynd Platform, the seller might still receive new orders but will not be able to see them in the Vinculum panel. Thus, you will have to process all these new orders using the Orders section of the Fynd Platform.
Older orders that had been placed before the extension was disabled will also have to be processed Orders section of the Fynd Platform.

Figure 25: Enable/Disable Inventory and Order Permissions