BigCommerce Setup - B2B

 

 Configure the Sales Channel for B2B

On the sales channel, General FastTab, turn on Enable B2B Features.

A B2B FastTab then appears with four fields.

Customers FastTab

B2B FastTab

 

API Data FastTab

Confirm API Engine Execution Module is populated. It normally matches the sales channel code. If it is blank, use the Execution Module action to load the defaults.

The most common failure:

If the execution module is blank or missing a row for an operation, B2B actions fail silently. No dialog appears. Check Last External Update Status and Last External Update Result on the record — "…is not implemented for this Sales Channel" means the execution module is the problem.

 

Companies

Open CSM Companies from the sales channel (Actions › B2B › Companies), or search for it and filter by channel.

 

Creating a company in Business Central and Sending It

• Create a new CSM Company and set BC Customer No. CSM copies the customer name and offers to create contacts and locations from the customer's Business Central contacts and ship-to addresses: All Contacts & Locations, Selected Contacts and Locations, or None.
• Review the created contacts and locations. On each location set Is Billing and Is Shipping, and mark one Is Default Billing and one Is Default Shipping.
• Set Main Contact Name, Default Billing Location, and Default Shipping Location on the company.
• Choose Actions › Send to channel › Company info. This creates the company on BigCommerce and stores its External ID.
• Choose Actions › Retrieve from channel › Contacts to pick up the BigCommerce user IDs, then send contacts and locations.

Required before a company can be sent:

• CSM validates these before every company send. Missing values raise an error naming the field.

  • The sales channel's API Channel Identifier
  • The company's BC Customer No.
  • On the default billing location: Billing Phone No. and Billing Company Country Code
  • On the main contact: Email, First Name, Last Name
• The location and contact checks only run when a default billing location and main contact are actually assigned. If they are blank, the send passes validation in Business Central and is then rejected by BigCommerce — set both before sending.
• Send the company first and let it acquire an External ID. Sending a company twice without an External ID creates a second company on BigCommerce.

 

Retrieving Companies Created on BigCommerce

• On the CSM Companies list, filtered to one sales channel, choose Actions › Retrieve from channel › Companies.
• On each retrieved company, choose Actions › Synchronize › To BC customer to create and link a Business Central customer from the B2B customer template, or set BC Customer No. manually to link an existing one.
• Choose Retrieve from channel › Contacts, then on each contact use Synchronize › Link or create BC contact.
• Choose Retrieve from channel › Locations, then on each location set Company Location Type and use Synchronize › To linked address.
• The companies list must be filtered to a single sales channel or the retrieve action errors with No filter found for CSM Sales Channel.
  
  

 

Locations

A CSM Company Location links to either the Business Central customer record or one of its ship-to addresses, set by Company Location Type (Customer or Ship-To) and Location Type Code.

BigCommerce channels add four flags to each location: Is Billing, Is Shipping, Is Default Billing, Is Default Shipping. A location must be marked Is Billing before it can be Is Default Billing, and the same for shipping. Setting a default clears the flag on every other location for that company.

 

Contact Roles

Turning on Enable B2B Features creates three contact roles matching BigCommerce's built-in roles: Admin, Senior Buyer, and Junior Buyer. Assign one to each contact using the Role field on the CSM Company Contact.

Not applicable on BigCommerce:

The Send to channel › Contact role and Retrieve from Channel › Contact roles actions on the CSM Contact Roles page, and the Role Assignments action on a contact, have no BigCommerce implementation. Roles are the three local roles above; they are not synchronized.

 

Orders

The standard BigCommerce order API does not return company information. When Enable B2B Features is on, CSM makes an additional call after order retrieval to fetch the B2B order and populate the company fields. With B2B off, those fields stay blank and no B2B matching occurs.

A B2B FastTab appears on B2B orders with the purchasing entity fields:

 

How CSM matches an Order to a Customer

CSM finds the CSM Company whose External ID equals the order's Purchasing Entity Company ID, then uses that company's BC Customer No. Matching is by External ID only.

If no match is found:

• New Company Behavior = Manual — the order errors and waits for you to create a CSM Company and link it to a customer.
• New Company Behavior = Auto Create — CSM creates the CSM Company (and, if configured, contact and location) from the order data with status Approved, then still stops the order.

In both cases the order goes to Error status until a Business Central customer is linked. Auto Create saves the data entry; it does not complete the order.

Auto-created CSM records hold no address data yet. Link them to Business Central customers, contacts, and ship-to addresses after populating the address fields, or you will push blank addresses back to BigCommerce.

 

Automations

Search API Automation and open the automation group B2B_MANAGEMENT_<sales channel code>. Each sales channel has its own group.

The B2B automation group and all seven steps are created with Enabled = No. Enable the group and the steps you want before expecting anything to synchronize.

Require Update Only

The three bulk send steps carry the automation property REQUIRE_UPDATE_ONLY set to true, so they send only records flagged External Requires Update. Any edit to a company, contact, or location sets that flag automatically.

SEND_COMPANY_STATUS ships without that property, which means it sends status for every company on the channel rather than only those flagged Status Requires Update. Add the property manually if you want it filtered.

Running Automations

• API Automation page — select the group and choose Run
• CSM Administrator Role Center — Run B2B Automation Now
• Job Queue — codeunit 70338473

Inbound steps skip companies with a blank External ID. A company that has never been sent to BigCommerce is never picked up — send it once manually first.

 

Maintenance

Company status

Change Status on the CSM Company, then choose Actions › Send to channel › Company status, or let the SEND_COMPANY_STATUS automation pick it up.

 

Pushing Business Central Changes to BigCommerce

Synchronizing sets External Requires Update, so the outbound automations will pick the record up on their next run. Address fields come from the linked CSM location, so make sure the location is linked to the right Business Central address.

 

Pulling BigCommerce Changes into Business Central

 

Bulk Update

Actions › Send to channel › All Info sends the company, its status, all contacts, and all locations in one step. It does not stop if one part fails — check Last External Update Result on each record afterwards.

 

Suppressing name synchronization

To stop company names synchronizing, enable a CSM Sales Operation Rule with rule code B2B-S-COMP-NAME (Business Central to CSM) or B2B-U-COMP-NAME (CSM to Business Central).

 

Troubleshooting