Basic Order Management System Design For Ecommerce Business

OSM coordinates the order fulfillment functions required to complete a customer order created in a CRM system or another order-source system. As an order management system, OSM receives and recognizes customer orders, then coordinates the operations necessary to complete the order across provisioning, shipping, inventory, invoicing, and other fulfillment systems. 

As a result, OSM plays a crucial role in your order management system. If you want to have a deep understanding from receiving to completing an order, let’s take a look at our writing on Basic Order Management System Design. 

Order Management System Design Overview

OSM is regarded as a system for order processing that receives orders from the CRM system as input and monitors the functions of fulfillment needed to finish the order. Operations including issuing a contact number, launching a network service, executing invoicing, and mailing a phone are all part of the fulfillment process. 

Customers are often registered and services are managed via tracking orders on a website or in the CRM system. A customer's order specifies what they want to buy, such as phone service. 

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The OSM is in charge of initiating and coordinating the functions of order fulfillment that are required to finish the order. If a consumer requires a contact service, for example, OSM could:

• Send customer management and billing inquiries to the billing system.
• Request a service and resource management (SRM) application to discover the resources of the network required to start the service, as well as the actions that must be taken on every resource; for instance, to determine whether the service has adequate circuit capacity and what network moves must be taken to dispense the circuit to the client.
• To make the network service active, send activation orders to Oracle Communications as soon as possible.
• Send a shipment inquiry to the shipping system, such as delivering a call to a customer.

The diagram below depicts how OSM accepts orders from the CRM framework and afterward works with numerous systems for external fulfillment to fulfill the orders. 

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The fulfillment system can implement the operations required to finish the order, such as activating network services or running billing. For this case, OSM works with the fulfillment systems operating Oracle Communications programs, such as Billing and Revenue Management (BRM), ASAP, and Unified Inventory Management (UIM).

OSM can interface with numerous external systems at the same time/ in a series of operations when processing an order. 

For instance, OSM can connect with the billing system while also collaborating with UIM to allocate resources and plan activities required to perform services on these resources. After you've determined your resources as well as activities in UIM (service and resource management), OSM can deliver these resources and activities to ASAP as activation orders, allowing the service to be activated. 

OSM keeps all interactions with other systems and may send each interaction status back to the system of order source. OSM does not have a predefined order fulfillment procedure because it can handle order processing for every sort of product or service. Instead, for each sort of order you process, you specify the OSM order fulfillment process. 

Some orders, for example, may necessitate installation or shipping, while others may not. The process of order fulfillment at the high level is as follows:

• The CRM system/self-service portal like a page is used to place an order. The order capture procedure does not include OSM. CRM systems usually construct and keep their order to track the purchase status of a customer. They utilize this order to update the consumer on the status of their order.
• The order is sent to OSM by the CRM system.
• The selling order arrives at OSM. It validated and converted the order into the OSM order in the format of OSM order. In case you have numerous sorts of orders defined, for instance, for various services, OSM constructs the sort of order needed to complete the order of a customer.

In OSM, an order can include:

• Add or cancel services, for example, are the functions of fulfillment that must be accomplished.
• The deadline that has been asked.
• Customer information that is necessary for the order process, such as the client's address.
• Information regarding the requested services, such as DSLAM port, bandwidth, or phone number.
• Information on the order's status, such as whether it's in process or finished.
• OSM carries out an order by completing tasks. Some activities require manual intervention; for example, the order processor may be required to manually verify that the equipment installation is done. The majority of tasks are automated, such as sending the network an activation order.
• OSM keeps track of the order's overall progress when tasks are accomplished. To track the order's progress and address any issues that arise, you can utilize OSM Task and OSM Order Management online clients.
• Once all the tasks have been completed, OSM notifies the source system that your order is fulfilled and that the customer can access the services.

About the Processes of Order Fulfillment Business

The below business processes are supported by OSM:

• If a customer requests a change to an order that is already in progress, you can send it to OSM again. OSM has the ability to adjust and roll back fulfilling tasks if needed. An order for 5Mbps bandwidth, for example, could be in the works. In case the customer desires to upgrade to 14Mbps bandwidth, an identical order is issued with the additional demand. The first order is referred to as a base order, while the second order is referred to as a revision order.
• Secondly, you may estimate how long it will need to process an order and offer clients an estimated delivery date. A customer may require a service to be activated at the later date in some cases, such as in the early of the following month. OSM could figure out when to begin the order so that the service is available on time.
• Order status can be reported in a variety of ways, containing each fulfillment task and the entire order’s status. Fulfillment states can be used to aggregate the numerous statuses obtained from numerous external services.
• Errors during the order process can be managed using procedures. Fallout refers to an error during the order process.
• Workgroups can be formed to manage order fallout and manual processing tasks. Workgroups can be used to delegate responsibilities to specific sorts of order operators, such as those who contact customers or those who manage rejected orders.

About Oder Management System Architecture

An OSM system contains web-based GUI applications, and interfaces for connecting involving external systems, system server components, and utilities. The diagram below depicts the components of the OSM system. 

The OSM system is comprised of the client components:

• Utilize the Task web client in order to keep track of and manage your tasks. Order processing workers generally utilize this program to check that all duties are done. The fallout managers of order use it as well. Some order administration functions, such as resuming, pausing, and calling off orders, are also available.
• To view precise information about the order process, use the Order Management web client. Developers who model orders and want to identify linkages among the specifications that they build inside Design Studio will benefit from seeing the order process displayed. Several order management functions, such as canceling orders, stopping and resuming orders, and handling fallout, are also available. From the Task web client, you may access the Order Management web client.
• Model different sorts of orders, jobs, and OSM entities to operate the process of order fulfillment in Design Studio. When designing your process of order fulfillment, you may also utilize Design Studio in order to create entities for Oracle products, such as ASAP activation processes and UIM services.

To put your process of order fulfillment into action, you construct cartridges within Design Studio; then deploy these cartridges on server systems of OSM. You can use numerous cartridges to deal with distinct functional areas, such as cartridges with fallout management capabilities of OSM as well as cartridges that install UIM functions. The server components of OSM are as follows:

• OSM server is in charge of managing OSM runtime features, such as incoming order processing and outgoing connections involving external systems. Oracle WebLogic Server is used to run the OSM server.

Typically, numerous OSM server instances are configured. You could, for example, design an OSM server version for receiving and processing inbound sales orders; another or many different OSM server versions to handle orders that need to interact with activation and provisioning systems. The OSM server primarily communicates with external systems via Java Message Service (JMS) queues. JMS is a component of the Java platform. As you set up OSM, you configure a JMS queue. JMS queues allow systems to communicate by posting and getting messages.

• OSM server is hosted by Oracle WebLogic Server. Oracle Fusion Middleware's WebLogic Server provides the services of Java JEE for hosted components, including availability, manageability, scalability, performance, and clustering.
• Oracle Database is used by OSM to hold both pending and completed orders. Also, the OSM database saves any OSM metadata you develop while modeling the process of order fulfillment. The specification you identify inside Design Studio, for example, is saved as metadata. At runtime, OSM utilizes the metadata like a template with the purpose of constructing orders’ instances. OSM information, which includes order templates and tasks, specifies the OSM Server's order model and behavior.

OSM communicates with the OSM database using Java Database Connectivity (JDBC).

About Building an Order Fulfillment Process

Utilizing OSM entails two distinct sorts of actions:

• Design-time activities. Activities that take place during design time. To use OSM, you must first define the order content as well as the process of fulfilling the order. You achieve this by modeling different order types, and OSM entities operating the process of order fulfillment in Design Studio. Using Design Studio to change the process of order fulfillment as your product catalog's products, offers, and bundles change. Sample cartridges in Design Studio are included in OSM to help you get started, yet you must construct your order fulfillment mechanism.
• Runtime activities. You can utilize the Task web client to conduct manual tasks; using the Task web client and the Order Management web client to follow order progress and deal with any issues that arise. You can utilize the Order Management web client to handle an order if an external system detects a problem, for example.

You perform the following to create and put your own fulfillment process of order into action:

• Identify your business needs, such as the items, bundles, and special offers you’ll sell.
• Prepare a strategy on how to put the fulfillment criteria for those items and services into action. Consider the following scenario:
  • OSM needs to connect with which systems (inventory, activation, and billing)?
  • What information is required to start a service?
  • What missions should be done manually; what should be done automatically?
  • Order changes are handled in what manner?
• Design Studio should be used to demonstrate the orders; fulfillment processes, as well as to test order execution.
• Incorporate the process of order fulfillment into your manufacturing system.
• Create new sorts of orders as well as make modifications to the way of completing orders as your business evolves.

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Conclusion

Basic Order Management System Design has provided you with the full circle of an order processing system. Please share your thoughts in the comments section below and contact us if we miss any information!