Two controls sit between a dealer's cart and the invoice: trade schemes, which decide what the dealer earns on the order, and credit limits, which decide whether the order may exist at all. Both are enforced by the platform, not by policy documents — this page covers how each behaves on B2B documents and on storefront carts, and links the full references.
Schemes on dealer orders
Because a dealer order is a standard sales order, the trade scheme engine treats it like any other: saving the document evaluates every approved Auto Apply scheme in validity, and qualifying slabs write their benefits onto it — scheme discounts on the lines, free-item lines added and marked as scheme-generated. Apply On Selection schemes wait for an explicit apply, and the qualified-slabs and recommendation actions show what the document earns now and how far it is from the next slab — useful prompts during dealer order capture, and the source of the offer hints on catalogue cards.
Three parts of the scheme model matter especially in a dealer network:
- Account scoping. A scheme can target accounts and account groups of type Scheme, and an account group of type Exclude Scheme keeps chosen dealers out — so a promotion can run for one tier of the network and not another. Only active group memberships count.
- Both sides of the chain. Scheme types cover sale orders and invoices and purchase orders and bills (plus repair orders), and the Per Period variants qualify on an account's accumulated performance rather than a single document. A distributor running xMatix gets scheme treatment on what they buy, not only on what they sell.
- Budgets. Unless a scheme is set to ignore budget, a benefit that applied on the sale order is carried onto the sale invoice only when both a global scheme budget and a matching partner budget (by account or account group) are configured with room; a scheme with a global-only, partner-only or no budget has its benefit dropped at invoicing. Consumption is recorded as documents apply and reversed when they are reset or deleted. Claimable schemes feed trade claims for settlement.
The slab, condition and benefit model — and the reset behaviour — are documented in full on the trade schemes page.
Schemes on storefront carts
A storefront cart runs the same engine in auto-apply mode, so a shopper sees the scheme discount and free goods the order will carry, and a coupon of benefit type scheme delegates to it rather than restating the offer. Two differences from a document: a cart records no budget consumption, because most carts are abandoned — consumption is booked when the order is placed — and an engine failure while pricing a cart degrades to an undiscounted total rather than blocking the shopper. Coupon value is kept in its own field on the cart and order, so promotion spend and negotiated discount stay distinguishable.
Credit control on ordering
The credit limit gate is the platform's answer to over-extended dealers. A limit is configured per customer per selling company, and the check runs twice:
- On order header insert, the check gates on the customer's existing open exposure — the new order's lines and amount are not yet known, so it is a guard against customers who are already over limit rather than a projected-exposure test. A customer with no limit and no outstanding balance is not gated.
- On invoice insert, the check includes the invoice amount against open receivables. If the receivables subledger cannot be read, invoicing is allowed to proceed rather than blocked; the order-time check has no such fallback and surfaces the failure.
Both checks are skipped entirely when the Sales setting Credit limit override requires approval is on — the tenant's approval process then owns the decision instead. A breach refuses the save with a message naming the account, the open amount, the document amount and the limit. Settled receivables reduce the open exposure used by subsequent checks.
On a storefront, pay on account is offered only to signed-in customers and shows the available credit from the same subledger; the order lands Draft for the tenant's approval.
Common questions
When exactly does a scheme land on a dealer order?
When the document is saved — evaluation is part of the save, so benefits appear as soon as the order is created or edited into qualification, and are refreshed as it changes. Nothing waits for a nightly job, and there is no separate "apply promotions" step unless the scheme is deliberately Apply On Selection.
Can I run a promotion for some dealers and not others?
Yes, by scoping: target the scheme at accounts or Scheme-type account groups, and put dealers who must not receive it in an Exclude Scheme group. Selling company and branch scoping narrow it further. Budgets then cap what any account or the whole scheme can consume.
Why did a scheme discount show on the order but disappear on the invoice?
Almost always the budget gate: the invoice carries the benefit only when both a global scheme budget and a partner budget are configured with room (or the scheme ignores budget). Check the scheme's budget rows for the partner or its account group.
Why was a small order blocked when the order itself is well within the limit?
Because the order-time check gates on the customer's existing open position: a dealer already over the limit is refused any new order until exposure comes down. The block message shows the open amount responsible — the levers are collecting payments, settling stale open items, or raising the limit. See credit limits.