Practice Mode — EDI Documentation

What Is Practice Mode?

Before you start exchanging real orders with a retailer, you need to make sure everything works correctly. That's what practice mode is for. It's a safe environment where you can send and receive test documents without affecting real orders, shipments, or invoices.

Think of it like a dress rehearsal before opening night. You go through every step of the process — receiving an order, acknowledging it, shipping it, and invoicing it — but nothing actually ships and no money changes hands.

Why Is Testing Required?

EDI is very precise. A misplaced field, a wrong date format, or a missing segment can cause a document to be rejected. Testing catches these issues before they affect your real business. Specifically, practice mode helps you:

Verify your connection — Confirm that documents are flowing between your system and the retailer's system.
Validate document formatting — Make sure your documents meet the retailer's exact specifications.
Practice your workflow — Get comfortable with the process before real orders are on the line.
Catch mapping errors — Ensure your product identifiers, addresses, and other data translate correctly.

Walking Through a Test Cycle

A typical practice test follows the standard order-to-payment flow. Here's what to expect:

Receive a Practice Order (850) — Your retailer (or RetailReady's built-in test tools) sends a sample purchase order. Check that the items, quantities, prices, and ship-to addresses look correct.
Send a Purchase Order Acknowledgment (855) — Acknowledge the order, confirming you received it and can fulfill it. The retailer's system validates that your 855 is formatted correctly.
Create a Test Shipment and Send an ASN (856) — Mark the test order as shipped and generate an Advance Ship Notice. This tells the retailer what's in each carton, the tracking numbers, and when to expect delivery.
Send a Test Invoice (810) — Invoice the retailer for the test order. Their system checks that your line items, quantities, and totals match the original purchase order.

Tip: RetailReady's practice mode includes a built-in order generator. You can create practice orders yourself to learn the workflow even before your retailer sends their test documents.

Common Issues Found During Testing

Don't be surprised if your first few test documents get rejected — that's the whole point of testing. Here are the most common issues:

Wrong ISA/GS identifiers — A typo in your EDI address causes documents to be undeliverable. Double-check every character.
Missing required segments — The retailer's spec may require fields that you left blank, such as a DUNS number or department code.
Date format mismatches — Some retailers expect YYYYMMDD, others expect YYMMDD. RetailReady handles this for you, but it needs to know which format the retailer expects.
Product identifier mismatches — The UPC on the purchase order doesn't match anything in your product catalog. This usually means you need to add a product mapping.
Incorrect totals — Your invoice total doesn't match the sum of line items, or quantities on the ASN don't match the purchase order.

When Is Testing "Done"?

Testing is complete when both sides agree that everything looks good. Typically this means:

You've successfully completed at least one full order cycle (850 → 855 → 856 → 810) with no errors.
The retailer's EDI team has reviewed your documents and confirmed they pass validation.
You're comfortable with the workflow and know what to expect when real orders arrive.

Once both you and the retailer sign off on testing, you can promote the connection to Certification (after passing preflight checks), where your documents will be sent to the retailer's actual system for final validation before going live.

Sandbox Troubleshooting

If you encounter errors during practice mode, here are the most common issues and how to resolve them: