As it happens, I was pouring just such dressing on my salad, while getting ready to dig into the chili, when I saw on the diner's TV, the announcement of Paul Newman's departure. What a shame. But with all that he's done, and all that he's left to us, I can only wish Paul the best, and thank him for his many contributions.

This particular contribution, was only partially his, but it's linked so closely to his character in Cool Hand Luke, that I always think of him when I think about problems of communicating.

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So, here's my beef... (you can probably tell that I've been chatting with Marlow)

What ever happened to following EDI standards? In the past several weeks I’ve experienced three EDI trading partners that are not following EDI structure for 850’s. And when confronted with a request to make changes to be within standards, they indicate that they have no intension or have no idea what I’m talking about.

The Gap is one major offender. They are sending their PO notes at the header level in an MTX which is correct, however its not placed correctly in the order of the segments required by EDI standards for X12 4020. It's also not wrapped. In addition, they are sending two PO4 segments at the item level; EDI standards only allows for one in version 4020.

Then both HMV Canada and Fred Meyer are making up their own EDI qualifiers. For HMV, trading partners should be aware that they are using the CTB segment instead of CSH to communicate whether the order can be backordered or not, which is probably fine (others use CTB for notes any way), but they created their own qualifier for CTB01 of BO, which is not a valid qualifier for X12 version 4010. And Fred Meyer is doing something similar with qualifiers in the CTP segment to report Returns Prices. Again not in the UCS standards!

You folks need to remember that most EDI translation software valid EDI data to the EDI standards. Creating retailer specific standards will cause data failures at the translator level.

Cheers...
Cecil