Manage Product Categories

Locate Product Category List

• The Product Categories are listed on the Products > Product Categories tab

Product Management Mechanisms

• In Abivin vRoute system, there are two Product management mechanisms:
• 1 - Shipper-oriented Product Management Mechanism: This mechanism is used when you want to set up your account as the Shipper
• 2 - Carrier/Distributor-oriented Product Management Mechanism: This mechanism is used when you want to set up your account as the Carrier/Distributor

Mechanism 1: Shipper-oriented Product Management Mechanism

• This mechanism should be used when you are the Shipper, directly produce and supply your Products to the Product distribution channels or the Consumers by your own vehicle fleet
• In this mechanism, the Manufacturer Organization will be the sole management Organization of all Product Categories. All lower-level Organizations will inherit the Product Categories from the Manufacturer
• This management mechanism is enabled by default. To know whether your account is currently set up in this mechanism or not, follow the steps below:
• Navigate to the Organizations > Organizations tab
• Click the Edit icon of the Manufacturer
• On the Update Organization form, navigate to the More Configuration > Model sub-tab
• Look at the Business section. If the 1PL radio box is currently ticked, that means your account is already using this mechanism

Mechanism 2: Carrier/Distributor-oriented Product Management Mechanism

• This mechanism is useful when you want to set up your account as the third-party logistics service provider (Also known as the Carrier or Transporter), which provides the transportation services for various Shippers
• In this mechanism, the Organizations of each Shipper will have their own Product Categories
• If you wish to switch to using this mechanism, tick the 3PL radio box instead (The steps to navigate to the setting area is described above in Mechanism 1)

• With each of these Product management mechanisms, the creation process of the Product Category, as well as the Product, will differ in certain steps

Create Product Categories

• You have two methods to create the Product Categories: Webform and Excel import file
• Below we will specify the input rules for each Product management mechanism

Create Product Categories For Shipper-Oriented Accounts

• If your account is set up following the Product management mechanism 1, follow the input rules in the table below

• As mentioned above, the Organization Code field in the Excel import file is no longer used. Therefore, when you import this file, on the Upload Data form, you need to do one more step which is to select the management Organization of the Product Categories. To do this, follow the steps below:
• Step 1: Click the Organization field at the bottom left of the form
• Step 2: Select the Manufacturer on the drop-down list. Alternatively, you can input the Organization Code/Organization Name of the Manufacturer into the search field to filter it out faster
• Step 3: Click Start Upload

Create Product Categories For Carrier/Distributor-Oriented User Accounts

• As mentioned above, the Organization Code field in the Excel import file is no longer used. Therefore, when you import this file, on the Upload Data form, you need to do one more step which is to select the management Organization of the Product Categories. To do this, follow the steps below:
• Step 1: Click the Organization field at the bottom left of the form
• Step 2: Select the appropriate Organization on the drop-down list. Alternatively, you can input the Organization Code/Organization Name of the Organization into the search field to filter it out faster
• Step 3: Click Start Upload
• Note: If you wish to create the same Product Categories for multiple Organizations at once, you could use a trick, that is to select the upper-level Organization of all the wanted Organizations on the Upload Data form, then tick the All Organization checkbox before importing. Using this trick, the Product Categories being imported will be created for the selected upper-level Organization as well as all of its lower-level Organizations
• For example: In the illustration image below, I have selected a Branch. After importing, the Product Categories will be created for that Branch as well as all the Depots/Suns/xDocks under that Branch

Update Product category

• Please refer to the CRUD functions article to know the general steps about updating objects in Abivin vRoute

Delete Product category

• Please refer to the CRUD functions article to know the general steps about deleting objects in Abivin vRoute

Search Product category

• If the Product category list is too long, the dispatcher can search for a specific product category by typing either its Category Code or Category Name into the Search field

Beginner's Guide

Create a Product Category

• Here is the guide to creating a product category using Web form:
• Step 1: Navigate to Products > Product Categories tab.
• Step 2: Click on the symbol Create (the symbol).

• Step 3: Input information to the required fields to complete the Category information
• Organizations: Input the Organization Name of the appropriate Organization into the search bar, then select from the drop down menu: Sample Depot
• Category Code: Input the management code assigned to the product category being created.
• Category Name: Input the product category type assigned to the product category being created. Values of this field depend on the actual product categories structure of your organization. For example: Main Category; Sub Category.
• Example:

• Step 4: Click SAVE.