Search
Understanding EDI
What is EDI?
Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) enables the exchange of business documents between businesses in a standardised format.
How does EDI work?
EDI enables companies with different hardware/software systems to exchange business documents in a common format. To facilitate this, a business needs access to an EDI solution. This allows the exchange of EDI transactions with customers and suppliers.

What type of documents can I send via EDI?
- Orders
- Invoices
- Advanced shipping notices
- Dispatch information
Companies also utilise EDI to transmit/translate the following documents:
- Inventory
- Catalogues
- Contracts
Why do businesses use EDI over paper-based management?
Companies have been utilising EDI to streamline their pay to procure process for over 40 years now. Many businesses are still using paper-based management to communicate with their trading partners – an ineffective and time-consuming method of communication.
Paper-based management comes with sizeable overhead expenses with printing, filing, document retrieval, postage, and storage just to name a few.
Manually entering data reduces your order processing speed and doesn’t properly equip your employees to process high volumes of orders efficiently. By automating your pay to procure process your business can receive data and documents within minutes, offering your company better visibility around communications.
The Key Benefits of EDI
- EDI eradicates manual data entry and increases your businesses processing speed
- Ensure brand loyalty by reducing errors and duplication in documents
- Digitalisation offers a time effective method of exchanging B2B documents
- Electronic exchange of documents offers traceability and security for all businesses
- All your EDI data visible on one easy-to-use user-friendly platform
Want to learn more?
Our team of in-house experts have years of experience providing EDI solutions for businesses just like yours. In our latest webinar, ‘Understanding EDI’, they share their expertise giving you a full insight on how EDI can transform your business processes.
Watch it for free here.

Recent Blogs
Welcoming Raj Deol, our new Solutions Architect
As part of our continued drive to recruit talented individuals that match our ambition, we are delighted to announce Raj… Read more
Welcoming David McGuinn to our Delivery team
We are continually recruiting new and talented people that will support our customers and help NetEDI with our ambitious growth… Read more
Cegedim 2020 – Financial Results
Amid tough conditions and in the backdrop of a global pandemic, Cegedim, NetEDI’s parent company, has shown its resilience with… Read more
Welcoming Arif Patel, our new Delivery Director
In our continued drive to meet our ambitious growth plans, we are delighted to announce the addition of Arif Patel… Read more
Welcome Glenn Waller, our new Solution Architect
As part of our continued and ambitious growth plans, we’re extremely excited to announce the addition of Glenn Waller. Glenn… Read more
What is integration? ERP integration is the synchronisation between your EDI and ERP system. Enabling your business with an industry… Read more
What are ASNs? Advance Shipping Notices, or ASNs for short, are electronically-sent notifications which provide notification of a pending delivery.… Read more
FREE WEBINAR: Understanding ASNs
Join us as we discuss all things Advance Shipping Notes (ASNs). This free webinar is being hosted by the UK’s… Read more
Seeing the Opportunity NetEDI have been on a long journey with Peppol. We first became aware of Peppol back in… Read more
Exciting and continued growth for NetEDI
The term ‘unprecedented times’ is one that has become a regular addition to all of our dialogue. The last few… Read more
FREE WEBINAR: Understanding EDI
Join us as we discuss how your business can benefit from EDI solutions. This free webinar is being hosted by… Read more
NetEDI achieve AS4 compliance under AS4EDI Guidelines
NetEDI and our customers are now compliant with new AS4EDI and European Union guidelines. What is the AS4EDI Project? The… Read more