EDI delivers numerous benefits to businesses across a variety of industries. From removing manual and often paper-based processes to reducing costs and making your business more streamlined, businesses using EDI can recognize a vast number of organizational benefits. 

If your business is trading in the retail, manufacturing, building, wholesale, food and beverage, pharmaceutical or logistics industry, then EDI will deliver time and cost savings as well as improved performance through automation. 

The advantages and benefits of Electronic Data Interchange Improved operational efficiency: Automating the flow of messages with integrated EDI improves the speed and efficiency of your operations by eliminating the need to rekey data into internal systems manually.

Fewer errors

By removing manual, paper-based processes, human errors are dramatically reduced or even eliminated. 

Increased accuracy

Automated message validation ensures that errors are flagged and rectified before they impact your trading partners and that data integrity in your internal systems is maintained. Large customers increasingly demand an efficient service from their trading partners, so exchanging EDI messages without error is a significant advantage for most organizations. 

Increased return on investment (ROI)

EDI lets businesses reinvest IT and administrative resources into other business areas by relying on automated tools to complete business transactions. Over time, a business's savings by repurposing staff can lead to significant competitive advantages. 

Enhanced visibility

EDI provides full transparency of the ordering and invoicing process for you and your trading partners. This end-to-end visibility enables more informed decisions and ultimately improves the service delivered to consumers. Supply chain visibility is essential for all successful businesses, and EDI helps you stay ahead of the competition. 

Reduced inventory cost

Increased visibility within the supply chain eliminates unknowns and can, therefore, enable you to reduce the levels of inventory you need to hold. 

Reduced manual workload

EDI allows businesses to avoid manually logging into their customer's trading portals. Instead, they can rely on a single electronic communication method to exchange orders, invoices and other EDI messages. In addition, automation delivers both time and financial savings.

EDI delivers benefits to businesses that are in line with how advanced the EDI system is. 

Web EDI

Often, businesses will begin using EDI to meet their customers’ immediate requirements. This usually involves logging into individual customer portals, which can be time-consuming and difficult to manage as your business grows.

Fully managed EDI

When businesses use fully managed EDI they experience a vast number of commercial benefits. By outsourcing EDI to a fully managed provider, companies can focus on their core competences and leave EDI to the experts. They are free from the burden of keeping ahead of new innovations and the need to stay on top of increasing trading partner complexities. Fully managed EDI providers allow organizations to experience all the benefits of EDI without having to invest time and headcount into the day-to-day upkeep of the system.

There are a number of key factors that should be considered when reviewing your EDI solution, many of these can have a serious impact on business-critical processes within your business. With this in mind, it's important you choose the best solution for your organization.

Because EDI is a complex technical tool, we understand that many organizations struggle to know what to look for when profiling a potential EDI partner. To help out, we have put together an essential list of criteria that businesses need to consider before choosing an EDI provider.