Frequently Asked Questions
Can you integrate with TallyPrime, Focus Softnet, NetSuite or Dynamics 365 Business Central?
Yes, and the effort varies more than people expect. A documented REST API sits near 60 hours. A nightly CSV drop that has to be reverse engineered, reconciled and monitored sits nearer 160. We scope each integration separately rather than quoting one number for all of them.
Is Odoo Inventory enough, or do we need a real WMS?
Odoo Inventory handles locations and stock moves well, and the gap is everything that makes a picker efficient rather than merely correct. If you are running a few thousand SKUs from one site it is often the right answer. At 40,000 SKUs across multiple sites with productivity targets, it is not, and stretching it there is a failure mode we have been called in to fix.
What is an 856 ASN, and why do retailers issue chargebacks against it?
It is the advance ship notice, and it carries the SSCC hierarchy that tells the retailer what is on each pallet before the truck arrives. If the SSCC on the label does not match the one in the message, the receiving scan fails, the goods get handled manually, and the cost comes back to you as a chargeback under the vendor agreement.
How is FEFO different from FIFO, and why does a modern trade customer care?
FIFO ships the oldest received stock. FEFO ships the earliest expiring stock, which is not always the same thing. Modern trade accounts often contract a minimum remaining shelf life, so an account may reject anything under 75 percent life while a wholesaler accepts 50. Your allocation logic has to know the rule per customer, or you will ship stock that is legally fine and contractually rejected.
Will the field app work with no signal in a cold store or on a rural beat?
It has to, and that shapes the architecture rather than a setting. Offline first means local storage, delta sync, conflict resolution on reconnect, and gap free invoice numbering per device so the tax sequence survives. Retrofitting this later is close to a rewrite of that app.
What does Fawtara mean for our invoicing?
Oman is moving to a Peppol based e-invoicing model, XML UBL 2.1 per PINT OM alongside a PDF/A-3, phasing from large taxpayers in August 2026 through to all remaining VAT registered businesses by August 2027 and B2G in 2028. Practically, invoicing stops being something your system prints and becomes something it transmits and gets acknowledged. Confirm the current phase dates before you plan around them.
Why might Bayan be rejecting our declarations?
The most common cause since January 2025 is tariff code length. Bayan requires 12 digit GCC Integrated Customs Tariff codes, and 8 digit declarations are auto rejected. If your product master still carries 8 digit codes, that is a data problem rather than a filing problem.
Do you handle Arabic invoices, right to left layout and Arabic product names?
Yes. Oman requires invoices in Arabic or bilingual form, with an Arabic version producible on request, and consumer packs carry mandatory Arabic labelling. Right to left is a layout and data concern from the first sprint, not a translation pass at the end.
What does phase one cost, how many hours is that, and how long does it take?
Roughly 1,550 to 2,760 hours, which at a $65 blended rate is about $101,000 to $179,000 before a 15 to 20 percent contingency. With a team of five at around 600 useful hours a month, that is three to five months. The module by module breakdown is on this page so you can check the arithmetic against your own scope.
Who owns the code, the data and the hosting account?
Ask this of every vendor you speak to, and get the answer in the contract rather than in an email. Our position is that the client should hold the hosting account and the repository, so that changing supplier is a commercial decision rather than a technical hostage situation. Confirm the specifics with us in writing before you sign.
