Manage Orders within Activation

Summary

Overview

The Akeneo Activation order module provides a self-service bridge for exchanging order data between your sales channels (such as Amazon or Mirakl-powered marketplaces) and your external systems (ERP, OMS, or CMS). Activation handles real-time order retrieval, storage, and outbound shipping confirmation updates so that every party in the chain — marketplace, merchant, and fulfillment system — stays synchronized.

The diagram above shows the order data flow in Akeneo Activation: orders are fetched from the marketplace, stored in Activation, pulled by an ERP or OMS via the Orders API, and shipping confirmations are pushed back to the marketplace.

Activation fetches orders every 5 minutes and pushes shipping confirmations back to marketplaces every 15 minutes. Order management is currently supported for:

  • Amazon Seller Central
  • Mirakl-powered marketplaces
  • eBay
  • Octopia-powered marketplaces (including Cdiscount)
  • Target Plus

Support for additional marketplaces — including Walmart, Bol, and Otto — is planned for future releases.

Beyond order processing, the Activation order module is also a central monitoring and troubleshooting hub. It detects errors in the order flow — including connection issues and operational disruptions — and alerts users so that issues can be resolved before they affect revenue.

Refunds and returns

Refund and return functionality will be available later in 2026.

New marketplace order support

When order management support for a new marketplace is launched, Akeneo Activation can only safely handle orders created on or after the official production launch date for that marketplace. You may encounter data synchronization issues with orders created before that date. To ensure reliable order processing, only process orders via Activation with a creation date on or after the newly supported marketplace's production launch date.

How does it work?

Data flow

Akeneo Activation facilitates end-to-end order synchronization between your sales channels (for example, Amazon Seller France) and your external systems (ERP, OMS, or CMS). The full flow is:

Channel connection:

  • Establish a connection to your sales channel (for example, Amazon Seller France) in Activation.
  • This process is the same as setting up a product information connection — see this article for details.

Order retrieval activation:

  • Navigate to your connected channel's settings in Activation.
  • Enable the Order Retrieval feature.

The screenshot above shows the Order Retrieval toggle inside an Activation channel's settings page.

Order synchronization:

  • Once enabled, Activation begins automatically retrieving order data from your sales channel every 5 minutes.
  • Orders become visible in the Activation order module.

Order data export (to ERP/OMS/CMS):

  • Activation provides an Orders API with a dedicated endpoint URL.
  • Your external system (ERP, OMS, or CMS) must integrate with this API to retrieve order data.
  • This is a pull method — your system pulls data from Activation.

Order confirmation (to Activation):

  • After processing orders in your external system, send order confirmations (for example, shipping updates and carrier information) back to Activation via the Orders API.
  • Confirmations can cover one or multiple orders at the same time.
  • Activation translates this data into the format expected by each marketplace.

Order confirmation transmission (to marketplaces):

  • Activation automatically transmits shipping confirmation data to the marketplaces every 15 minutes.
  • You can also turn confirmation transmission on or off per channel in your Activation channel settings — for example, if you want to pull orders into Activation but confirm them via another tool.

The screenshot above shows the Order Confirmation toggle inside an Activation channel's settings page.

Order data storage and association:

  • All order data is stored securely within Activation.
  • Orders are automatically associated with their corresponding products in the Activation platform.

Product information, product offers, and orders work independently. You do not need to send product information or product offers before fetching orders in Activation. As long as you are connected to the channel, you can retrieve orders and push order confirmation updates.

Working with the Orders API

To exchange order data between a third-party system and Activation, you need to use the Orders API. The API guide explains how to call the API to fetch orders from Activation and then push order confirmation updates back at your own cadence. The guide covers all the data points required in shipment confirmation calls so that Activation sends accurate data back to the marketplaces.

Access token

  • Every new customer is assigned a unique access token when connecting a PIM to the Activation app. This token is required to call the API.

  • To generate a new access token, go to your Activation app settings:

    1. Go to Activation settings.
    2. Select the Activation settings tab.
    3. Click the generate token button (the arrows icon).

The screenshot above shows the API token generation button in Activation settings, on the Activation settings tab.

Order list

If you are connected to an Activation channel and have enabled order retrieval, you can view your orders directly in Activation. From the main menu on the left, click Orders.

The order list displays all orders across all marketplaces you are connected to.

Search and filters

To manage your orders efficiently, search and filter options are available at the top of the order list. Filters can be combined to refine results and cleared by selecting All.

You can search by the order IDs provided by the marketplaces. The following filters are available:

  • Status — filter by order status:
    • All
    • Pending
    • Waiting for shipment
    • Partially shipped
    • Shipped
    • Refused
    • Canceled
    • Unknown
    • (Status meanings are described in the Order status section below.)
  • Your connected channels — filter by marketplace:
    • All
    • Example: Amazon FR, Amazon ES, Walmart
  • Syndication channels — filter by Activation channel:
    • All
    • Example: Amazon FR 1, Amazon FR 2, Amazon FR
  • Date — filter by when Activation received the order:
    • All (default)
    • Today
    • Yesterday
    • This week (starting on Mondays)
    • Last week (previous 7 rolling days)
    • This month
    • Last month
  • Order errors — filter orders by error state:
    • All
    • Contain errors
    • No errors

The animation above shows the order list in Akeneo Activation, including the search bar and available filter options.

Order count

The total number of orders matching your current search appears in the top-right corner of the table.

Sort

You can sort the order list by the Errors and Purchase date columns.

Split orders and mixed fulfillment

When an order includes items fulfilled by both the merchant and the marketplace, Activation displays these as two distinct orders. Each resulting order typically has its own unique order number assigned by the marketplace.

Order details

To view full order information in Activation, click any row in the order list. The order details page is organized into several sections.

Key order information:

  • Order IDs:
    • Order ID — unique ID from the marketplace for each order
    • Line item ID — unique ID from the marketplace for each line item within an order
    • Internal ID — unique ID generated by Activation to facilitate internal operations
  • Order dates
  • Order status
  • Payment details

The information shown can differ depending on the marketplace. Some marketplaces provide supplementary data such as VAT or sales tax calculations.

The animation above shows the order details view in Akeneo Activation, with key order information including IDs, dates, status, and payment details.

Buyer information:

  • Contact information (email, phone number)
  • Shipping and/or billing addresses

The screenshot above shows the buyer information section of an order detail page, including contact details and addresses.

Ordered products:

  • Product identification — GTIN (Global Trade Item Number), provided by the marketplace
  • Channel — marketplace on which the product was ordered
  • Quantity — number of units ordered
  • Total price — combined price for the ordered quantity of the product
  • View product — if the ordered product was part of a product export from Activation, click View product to access the product's information directly from your Activation channel product grid

The screenshot above shows the ordered products section of an order detail page, including GTIN, channel, quantity, total price, and the View product button.

Order status

Order status in Akeneo Activation shows the current processing stage for an order. Waiting for shipment and Shipped are the most common statuses. Other statuses may be marketplace-specific.

The screenshot above shows the order status indicators in Akeneo Activation.

Key points:

  • Shipped means a shipment was processed in Activation, not necessarily that the confirmation has been sent to the marketplace yet.
  • Canceled means the cancellation process started and finished.
  • Each marketplace has its own order status definitions. Activation creates a standardized, marketplace-agnostic system where possible, but you should always verify how a new marketplace handles order statuses before fully automating your order process.
Status API status Description
Pending PENDING The order has not been picked up by the webstore or order management system yet.
Waiting for shipment WAITING_FOR_SHIPMENT The order has been acknowledged by the webstore or order management system and has a merchant order number. It remains in this status even if partially shipped or partially canceled, as long as one or more items still need to be shipped.
Shipped SHIPPED The order has been shipped.
Partially shipped PARTIALLY_SHIPPED The order is partially shipped, with one or more items still to be shipped — this typically occurs with partial merchant-fulfilled orders.
Canceled CANCELED The order is canceled, either by the merchant, the customer, or the marketplace.
Refused REFUSED Mirakl-specific status. An order refused by the marketplace; unlikely to be used in most workflows.
Unknown UNKNOWN Default fallback status for any new status codes received from a marketplace; unlikely to be used in most workflows.

Order cancellation requests

Akeneo Activation handles order cancellation requests received from marketplaces, whether initiated by the marketplace or the buyer.

  • Logging and API availability — Activation logs all cancellation requests and makes this information accessible through the Orders API.
  • UI filtering — the Activation order list includes a filter that lets you display only orders with canceled items.
  • Cancellation labels — orders with cancellation requests are marked with specific labels in the UI so you can identify them quickly in lists and reports.

The screenshot above shows the cancellation request labels applied to orders in the Akeneo Activation order list.

When a customer requests a cancellation from a marketplace, a cancellation_requested event is created. To prevent this event from being misinterpreted as a duplicate order in your data exports, Activation provides a dedicated way to identify and handle these requests when exchanging order data via FTP.

Two components streamline this workflow:

  • A cancellation_requested attribute that clearly flags affected orders in export files.
  • A channel filter that can automatically separate orders with cancellation requests into a dedicated file.

This keeps your primary order processing system clean while routing cancellation data to a separate handling path.

Configure cancellation handling

To control how cancellation requests are exported, navigate to your Activation channel > Settings tab, go to the Order section, and toggle Exclude orders with cancellation requests.

The screenshot above shows the "Exclude orders with cancellation requests" toggle in the Order section of an Activation channel's Settings tab.

Export outcomes

Setting disabled (default behavior)

When the toggle is disabled, your channel produces a single export file containing all orders.

  • Output: One CSV file includes all orders, including those with cancellation requests.
  • How it works: A cancellation_requested column is added to the file. The value is true for any order with a pending cancellation and false for all others.
  • Best for: Systems that can use the cancellation_requested flag to apply their own internal routing or filtering logic.
  • Example:
order_id customer_name total_amount cancellation_requested
ORD-001 Jane Doe 55.00 false
ORD-002 John Smith 120.50 true
ORD-003 Sam Jones 32.75 false

Setting enabled

When the toggle is enabled, the export job splits the output into two separate files.

  • Output:
    • A primary export file containing only active orders ready for processing.
    • A second file containing only orders with cancellation requests.
  • How it works:
    • Your main file (for example, orders.csv) contains only orders where cancellation_requested is false.
    • A second file is automatically generated with a _cancellations suffix (for example, orders_cancellations.csv) and contains only orders where cancellation_requested is true.
  • Best for: Workflows where the ERP should not receive orders that have a cancellation request, allowing you to direct cancellation requests to a separate team or automated process.

  • Example outputs:

    • Main file:
    order_id customer_name total_amount cancellation_requested
    ORD-001 Jane Doe 55.00 false
    ORD-003 Sam Jones 32.75 false
    • Cancellations file (orders_export_[syndicationChannelCode]_items_with_cancellation_request_[filesystemSafeNowIsoDate].csv):
    order_id customer_name total_amount cancellation_requested
    ORD-002 John Smith 120.50 true

Email notifications: You can configure email notifications for order cancellation requests. See this article for configuration details.

Order errors

Akeneo Activation actively monitors the order lifecycle for errors during:

  • Order retrieval from marketplaces.
  • Data transformation.
  • Order updates sent to marketplaces or connected systems (ERP/OMS/CMS).

All detected errors are logged for troubleshooting and auditing. To view them, go to Logs in the main left-hand menu.

The animation above shows the Logs view in Akeneo Activation, displaying order error entries with timestamps and error details.

Error notifications:

Activation alerts users to processing issues during the order lifecycle:

  • Email notifications — critical errors trigger email alerts to designated users. See this article for details.
  • Order details UI — errors related to a specific order appear directly in that order's details page. Click … then Copy error details to copy the error log for troubleshooting.

The screenshot above shows the error details panel within an order's detail page in Akeneo Activation, with the copy error details option.

Types of errors monitored:

  • Failed order retrieval from marketplaces.
  • Failed order push or pull to or from connected systems (ERP/OMS/CMS).
  • Failed order confirmation transmission to marketplaces.
  • Cancellation request processing failures.
  • General system connectivity failures.

Exchange order data with external systems via FTP

The preferred method for exchanging order data with external systems is the Orders API (see the Working with the Orders API section above). If connecting to the API is not feasible, Activation also supports exchanging order data via FTP using CSV files. This option is available for systems that do not support direct API communication.

The screenshot above shows the FTP order exchange configuration options available in Akeneo Activation channel settings.

Order export job

Overview

Akeneo Activation can export order data to external systems via FTP. The order export job is configured within the Activation channel settings and uses FTP connections (see this article for FTP connection setup).

Job configuration

  1. In Activation, open the settings for the relevant channel.
  2. Go to the Order section.
  3. Enable the order export job using the toggle.
    • When enabled, Activation exports order data as CSV files to your specified FTP storage. Only orders updated by the marketplace since the previous export are included.
  4. Set the export frequency — available intervals include every 15, 30, or 45 minutes, hourly, daily, or weekly.
  5. Select an FTP connection from the dropdown, or create a new one by clicking +.
  6. Specify the folder path on the FTP storage where exported files should be saved.
    • Settings are saved automatically after you set the folder path.

The screenshot above shows the order export job configuration panel in Akeneo Activation channel settings, including frequency, FTP connection, and folder path fields.

Export template

The order export job uses the following CSV structure:

Column name Examples Can be empty Type / Format Description Note
order_status SHIPPED ❌ String Status of the order PENDING | WAITING_FOR_SHIPMENT | PARTIALLY_SHIPPED | SHIPPED | REFUSED | CANCELED | UNKNOWN
order_id 402-2654339-9122716 ❌ Identifier The marketplace order ID
purchase_date 2024-11-15T19:56:04.000Z ❌ ISO date string The date the product was purchased
fulfilled_by merchant ✅ String The party responsible for fulfillment merchant (fulfilled by you) | marketplace (fulfilled by the marketplace) | empty (not provided by the marketplace)
customer_name John Doe ✅ String Name of the customer May be empty depending on order status (for example, before WAITING_FOR_SHIPMENT)
customer_phone 0102030405 ✅ String Phone number of the customer May be empty depending on order status
shipping_address_line_1 13 place Aristide Briand ✅ String First line of the shipping address May be empty depending on order status
shipping_address_line_2 2 eme etage ✅ String Second line of the shipping address May be empty depending on order status
shipping_postal_code 44000 ✅ String Shipping postal code May be empty depending on order status
shipping_city Nantes ✅ String Shipping city May be empty depending on order status
shipping_country_code FR ✅ String Shipping country code (ISO 2-letter) May be empty depending on order status
product_sku 12345 ❌ String Product SKU
quantity_ordered ❌ Number Quantity ordered
quantity_shipped ❌ Number Quantity shipped
quantity_remaining_to_ship ❌ Number Remaining quantity to ship Formula: quantity_ordered - quantity_shipped
unit_price 39.9 ❌ Number Price per single unit Formula: line_total / quantity_ordered. Returns 0 if quantity_ordered == 0 (for example, a canceled order).
line_total 119.7 ❌ Number Total price including taxes for all units ordered Returns 0 if no price was received from the marketplace
line_number 1 ❌ Number Product index in the order line list Starts from 1

Some fields in the file can be empty depending on the order status.

Download template file

File filter (optional)

Filter the export by order status to include only matching orders. Select one or more statuses:

  • Pending
  • Waiting for shipment
  • Partially shipped
  • Shipped
  • Refused
  • Canceled
  • Unknown

If no status is selected, all orders are included.

File split groups (optional)

Split the export file based on these criteria (on/off toggles):

  • Fulfillment type — generates separate CSV files for marketplace-fulfilled orders and seller-fulfilled orders (for example, FBA vs. FBM for Amazon).
  • Shipping country — generates separate CSV files by shipping destination country (for example, an order placed on Amazon Seller France but shipping to Spain).

File naming conventions

Active split groups File name pattern Example
None orders_export_[syndicationChannelCode]_[isoDate].csv orders_export_amazon_vendor_us_2025-04-11T15-37-34.5132.csv
Fulfillment type orders_export_[syndicationChannelCode]_[fulfilledBy]_[isoDate].csv orders_export_amazon_vendor_us_merchant_2025-04-11T15-37-34.5132.csv
Shipping country orders_export_[syndicationChannelCode]_[shippingCountryCode]_[isoDate].csv orders_export_amazon_vendor_us_FR_2025-04-11T15-37-34.5132.csv
Both orders_export_[syndicationChannelCode]_[fulfilledBy]_[shippingCountryCode]_[isoDate].csv orders_export_amazon_vendor_us_merchant_FR_2025-04-11T15-37-34.5132.csv

Order shipment confirmation job

Overview

Akeneo Activation can import order shipment confirmation data from external systems via FTP. This allows you to update order statuses in Activation based on shipment details provided by an external source. The job is configured in the Activation channel settings and uses the same FTP connections as the order export job.

Job configuration

  1. In Activation, open the settings for the desired channel.
  2. Go to the Order section.
  3. Enable the order shipment confirmation import job using the toggle.
    • When enabled, Activation checks your specified FTP storage for new shipment update CSV files. Processed files are deleted afterward.
  4. Set the frequency — available intervals include every 15, 30, or 45 minutes, hourly, daily, or weekly.
  5. Select an FTP connection from the dropdown, or create a new one using +.
  6. Specify the folder path on the FTP storage where shipment confirmation CSV files are located.
    • Settings are saved automatically after you set the folder path.

The screenshot above shows the order shipment confirmation import job configuration panel in Akeneo Activation channel settings.

Import template

Column name Examples Required Type / Format Description Note
id d3c712bc-8be3-222b-e6aa-f57bd1a0e4f6 ✅ / ❌ Identifier Activation internal order ID Either id or original_id is required
original_id 012-3456789-0000000 ✅ / ❌ Identifier Marketplace order ID Either id or original_id is required
package_id 1 ✅ String (numeric) Package identifier Usually 1 when there is only one package
tracking_number A123456 ✅ String Shipment tracking number
shipping_date YYYY-MM-DD ✅ ISO date Shipping date
carrier_code UPS ✅ String Carrier code
item_id 15.0 ✅ / ❌ Identifier Activation order item ID Required when item_quantity_shipped is provided — either item_id or item_original_id must be present
item_original_id USD ✅ / ❌ Identifier Marketplace order item ID Required when item_quantity_shipped is provided — either item_id or item_original_id must be present
item_quantity_shipped 2 ❌ Integer Number of units shipped for this item Required only when a subset of the order has been shipped

Download template file

File naming convention:

[syndicationChannelCode]-CONFIRMATION_YYYY-MM-DD_HH-MM-SS_[jobId]_[locale].csv

Example: amazon_seller_fr-CONFIRMATION_2025-04-23_13-31-53_1113703_fr.csv

Automated order management critical path

With a full API integration, Akeneo Activation automates the end-to-end order handling workflow. Your third-party system (ERP or OMS) manages the core order process.

Critical path workflow:

  1. A marketplace order arrives. Activation status: Waiting for shipment.
  2. Activation sends the order to your third-party system (ERP/OMS). Activation status: Waiting for shipment.
  3. Your third-party system processes the order.
  4. Your third-party system ships the order and sends tracking information to Activation. Activation status: Shipped.
  5. Activation updates the marketplace with shipment details.
  6. The marketplace notifies the customer.

Current limitations

The following actions are not currently supported from the Activation order hub:

  • Creating orders manually in Activation
  • Creating returns for an order from Activation
  • Requesting refunds for an order from Activation
  • Automatically updating product inventory across channels when an order is received

Want to find out more? Take a look at these related articles