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EDI 846 Inventory Inquiry/Advice: How Suppliers Share Stock Levels With Retailers and 3PLs
Last updated: October 11, 2026 · Independent guide · We do not sell rankings or coverage.
The EDI 846 Inventory Inquiry/Advice is the X12 transaction a supplier, brand or warehouse uses to report how much of each item it can sell or ship. Each line names the item in the LIN segment, gives one or more quantities in QTY segments (available for sale, on hand, on order), and can add a date when more stock arrives. Drop-ship retailers use the 846 to decide what to show as in stock on their websites, and 3PLs use it to send brands a snapshot of what the warehouse holds. The quantity you report should come from your ERP’s available-to-promise figure after a safety buffer, not from raw on-hand stock.
The 846 process runs in six stages:
- Agree the specification and item cross-reference with each trading partner.
- Define the reportable quantity from ERP or WMS data.
- Apply buffers and channel allocation so you do not oversell.
- Generate and map the 846 through your EDI provider or connector.
- Transmit on the partner’s schedule and check acknowledgments.
- Reconcile and fix rejections, then confirm the partner’s site matches your feed.
What an 846 carries
In X12 release 4010, the 846 has a mandatory LIN loop that can repeat 10,000 times, and an optional QTY loop under each item that can repeat 99 times. Inside the QTY loop, an SCH (line item schedule) loop can repeat 25 times, and a REF loop can carry serial number, lot number and inventory data (Stedi, no date shown). Stedi sells EDI software. X12 allows the 846 to flow from a seller to a buyer or from one location to another.
| Segment | What it holds | Common codes | Data your system supplies |
|---|---|---|---|
| BIA | Purpose, report type, reference, date | 00 original, 04 change; SI seller inventory report | Unique report ID and timestamp |
| LIN | Item identifiers in qualifier and value pairs | UP (UPC), EN (EAN), UK (GTIN-14), VN (vendor item), IN or BP (buyer item), SK (SKU) | Your SKU plus the partner’s item number and GTIN |
| QTY | A quantity and its meaning | 33 available for sale, 17 on hand, 63 on order, 29 projected available | Available-to-promise after buffer; open purchase orders |
| SCH or DTM | When more stock will be available | 018 available | Expected receipt date of the next purchase or production order |
| REF, N1 | Vendor number, status, warehouse | VR vendor ID, ACC status, WS warehouse | Partner-assigned vendor ID, discontinued flag, location codes |
| CTT | Count of LIN lines | n/a | Calculated by the translator |
The quantity qualifier meanings come from the X12 4010 code list for element 673 (Stedi, no date shown). Retailers use only a few of them. Leslie’s Poolmart’s guide, written by SPS Commerce, accepts 33 (available for sale), 63 (on order) and QH (quantity on hold for Leslie’s), with a DTM 018 “Available” date in every QTY loop (Leslie’s Poolmart 846, April 13, 2020). Walmart’s drop-ship vendor 846 uses QTY 17 (on hand) and availability codes such as pre-order, seasonal and run out, with DTM start and end dates (Walmart, April 12, 2026). Other guides put the next availability date in an SCH segment with qualifier 018 (Logicbroker 846 guide, November 2, 2021).
Two different flows: drop-ship feeds and 3PL snapshots
The same transaction set serves two jobs that you should design separately. In a drop-ship feed, you tell a retailer what it can sell. In a 3PL snapshot, the warehouse tells you what it holds.
| Aspect | Supplier to retailer (drop ship) | 3PL to brand |
|---|---|---|
| Purpose | Set the sellable quantity on the retailer’s site | Reconcile ERP stock to the warehouse |
| Typical quantity | QTY 33 available for sale, after your buffer | On hand, allocated, available and held or damaged stock by location and lot |
| Item ID | Retailer’s item number or UPC, plus your SKU | Your SKU as set up in the WMS |
| Frequency | Set by the retailer, from weekly to every few minutes | Agreed in the 3PL contract |
| Failure cost | Oversold orders, cancellations, scorecard penalties | ERP shows stock that is not there, so orders ship short |
Extensiv’s 3PL Warehouse Manager, a WMS sold to 3PLs, tracks on hand, allocated, available and quarantined units for each client and item (Extensiv, September 11, 2025). Ask which of these figures your 3PL’s 846 carries, because on hand alone overstates what you can sell. Our guide to the EDI 940 and 945 warehouse documents explains how the 846 and 947 fit into the rest of the brand-to-3PL exchange.
Some retailers use the 846 for store data instead. CVS’s guide reports store balance on hand and targeted inventory level in SDQ segments rather than QTY (CVS, November 7, 2025). Retailer sell-through data for replenishment usually travels in the 852 used in vendor managed inventory programs.
Stage 1: Agree the specification and item cross-reference
Owner: EDI or ecommerce manager, with the retailer’s onboarding team. Inputs: the partner’s 846 guide and its item setup file. Output: a mapped cross-reference of your SKU to the partner’s item ID and GTIN.
Each retailer decides which LIN qualifiers are mandatory. JCPenney’s factory-ship guide requires its own 11-digit merchant SKU in LIN03, with qualifier IN in LIN02 (JCPenney 846, August 7, 2016). Sportsman’s Guide requires a GTIN, EAN or UPC plus your SKU or vendor item number, and says to send only items agreed with its buyer (Sportsman’s Guide 846, August 7, 2017). Home Depot drop-ship feeds through CommerceHub need the supplier SKU, Home Depot’s merchant SKU and a warehouse code that matches the code set up in CommerceHub (Logicbroker, no date shown).
Control: keep the cross-reference in your ERP or EDI system and sign off each new item before it enters the feed.
Stage 2: Define the reportable quantity
Owner: operations or inventory manager. Inputs: on hand, committed orders, open receipts. Output: a documented formula for each partner.
Raw on-hand stock includes units already committed to other orders. NetSuite commits items to sales, work and transfer orders, and when a sales order quantity is cut below the quantity committed, the units removed return to the available count (Oracle NetSuite, no date shown). NetSuite’s Available to Promise feature, enabled under Items & Inventory, shows an earliest available date from supply and demand by location (Oracle NetSuite, no date shown). Business Central calculates projected available balance as quantity on hand plus scheduled receipts minus gross requirements, viewable by location (Microsoft, August 21, 2025).
What goes wrong: reporting on hand as QTY 33, counting stock at locations that cannot ship drop-ship orders, or sending location splits to a partner that wants totals. Sportsman’s Guide asks for corporate-level quantities regardless of ship-from location.
Stage 3: Apply safety-stock buffers and channel allocation
Owner: ecommerce or channel manager. Output: buffer rules by item and channel.
A buffer subtracts units from the quantity you advertise so that orders arriving between feeds do not exceed real stock. NetSuite Connector supports a fixed buffer (for example, 50 fewer units than NetSuite shows) or a percentage buffer, with an item-level checkbox to switch it on (Oracle NetSuite, no date shown). If several retailers draw on the same stock, allocate it or buffer each feed harder.
Illustration (invented figures): you hold 500 units of a SKU, 120 are committed and 200 more arrive on November 3. ATP is 380. With a 10% buffer you report QTY*33*342 and QTY*63*200 with an available date of November 3. At three units an hour at each of two retailers on a four-hour feed, up to 24 units can sell before your next file, which the 38-unit buffer covers.
Stage 4: Generate and map the 846
Owner: EDI provider or internal integration team. Output: a partner-specific 846 map and a scheduled job.
Your EDI provider reads the quantity from a saved search or ERP availability table, applies the cross-reference and writes each partner’s version of the 846. Status flags matter too: Walmart says to send at least two consecutive updates with not-active or deleted codes before a UPC is removed from the feed (Walmart, April 12, 2026). Sportsman’s Guide treats supported items missing from the file as out of stock and requires zero-quantity items to be included.
Stage 5: Transmit on the partner’s schedule
Owner: EDI manager. Control: job monitoring and 997 acknowledgment checks.
Frequency is set by the partner. JCPenney’s guide asks for a full file with BIA01 code 00 once a week and change files (code 04) during the week. Leslie’s Poolmart and Sportsman’s Guide require at least one file a day. Convictional encourages updates every 5 to 15 minutes and does not process an 846 whose BIA04 date is older than the last one processed (Convictional, no date shown). Orderful, an EDI vendor, says Amazon and major ecommerce retailers often require hourly 846 updates for drop-ship inventory (Orderful, January 15, 2026). A 997 confirms syntax only, not that the catalog updated.
Stage 6: Reconcile and fix rejections
Owner: EDI manager with operations. Inputs: 997 and 824 responses, partner portal errors, spot checks of the retailer’s site.
Most 846 problems trace back to item identity rather than quantity. The common causes are:
- Item not on file: the LIN carries a UPC or buyer item number the retailer has not set up, so the line is dropped or the file errors. Celigo’s NetSuite-to-Orderful 846 flow only sends items that have an item ID map, which hides the gap until someone checks (Celigo, no date shown).
- Wrong qualifier or location: a vendor item number sent as UP, or a warehouse code that does not match the partner’s setup.
- Bad dates and negative quantities: Convictional requires BIA04 dates that are not in the future and not older than the last file processed, and QTY02 values that are not negative.
- Pack size confusion: eaches reported against a case-pack item ID, which inflates or understates stock by the pack quantity.
Oversold orders can turn into cancellations and fines; see our guide to retail chargebacks.
Who does what
| Stage | Responsible | Accountable | Consulted or informed |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. Spec and cross-reference | EDI analyst | EDI or ecommerce manager | Retailer onboarding, item master owner |
| 2. Reportable quantity | Inventory planner | Operations manager | ERP administrator, 3PL |
| 3. Buffers and allocation | Channel manager | Head of sales or ecommerce | Finance, planning |
| 4. Generate and map | EDI provider | EDI manager | ERP administrator |
| 5. Transmit | EDI provider | EDI manager | Retailer EDI team |
| 6. Reconcile and fix | EDI analyst | EDI manager | Operations, customer service |
Metrics to track
- Feed timeliness: share of scheduled 846s delivered on time, by partner.
- Line acceptance rate: lines that updated the partner’s catalog divided by lines sent.
- Oversell rate: drop-ship orders cancelled for lack of stock as a share of orders received.
- Buffer efficiency: units withheld by buffers compared with units oversold, reviewed monthly by SKU.
- 3PL variance: units by SKU and lot where the 3PL’s 846 differs from ERP on hand.
How software supports each stage
SPS Commerce runs the 846 as a full-service product and says it maintains maps when partner requirements change (SPS Commerce, no date shown). It sells an integration for Business Central, though its page for that ERP does not describe how the 846 quantity is sourced (SPS Commerce, no date shown). Its portal also lets you key an inventory advice by hand (SPS Commerce, May 20, 2026), which suits only a small catalog.
TrueCommerce generates the 846 for NetSuite from the Items list (TrueCommerce, May 5, 2025) and says its Business Central integration pulls inventory availability from Business Central (TrueCommerce, November 30, 2023). Neither page states which availability field is used, so confirm in testing that committed stock is excluded.
Orderful’s NetSuite connector is more explicit: you supply a saved search or dataset with item, available quantity and location columns, can send one 846 per location, and schedule the script deployment yourself (Orderful, January 29, 2026). Because you write the search, you control the ATP and buffer logic. The EDI 856 advance ship notice follows once a drop-ship order ships.
How we researched this
We read the X12 4010 structure and code lists for the 846, eight retailer and platform implementation guides (Walmart, CVS, JCPenney, Leslie’s Poolmart, Sportsman’s Guide, Convictional, Home Depot through CommerceHub, and a Logicbroker template), and vendor documentation from Oracle NetSuite, Microsoft, SPS Commerce, TrueCommerce, Orderful, Celigo and Extensiv. We checked every page on October 11, 2026.
Related guides
- EDI 850 Purchase Order: Segments, 855 and ERP Mapping
- EDI 810 Invoice: Requirements, Rejections and ERP Setup
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between QTY 33 and QTY 17 in an 846?
QTY 17 is quantity on hand, the physical stock. QTY 33 is quantity available for sale, which should exclude stock already committed to other orders. Most drop-ship retailers ask for 33, though Walmart’s drop-ship 846 uses 17, so follow each partner’s guide.
How often should I send an EDI 846?
As often as each partner requires. Published guides range from a weekly full file with change files in between (JCPenney) to at least daily (Leslie’s Poolmart, Sportsman’s Guide) to every 5 to 15 minutes (Convictional). Faster feeds let you use smaller buffers.
Why does my 846 get a 997 but the retailer still shows the wrong stock?
A 997 only confirms the file passed syntax checks. The retailer can still drop lines whose item IDs are not on file or whose location codes do not match. Check the partner’s 824 or portal error report and compare a sample of SKUs against its site.
Should I send zero quantities or leave items out?
Send zeros unless the partner says otherwise. Sportsman’s Guide requires zero-quantity items, and Walmart asks for two consecutive inactive or deleted updates before a UPC leaves the feed.
Does my 3PL have to send me an 846?
Only if your warehouse agreement requires it. Ask for a daily snapshot that separates on hand, allocated, available and held stock by lot, and compare it with ERP weekly.
Sources
- Stedi (EDI vendor), X12 4010 846 Inventory Inquiry/Advice, no date shown.
- Stedi, X12 4010 element 673 Quantity Qualifier, no date shown.
- Walmart, 846 Inventory Inquiry/Advice (DSV), April 12, 2026.
- CVS Health, CVS 4010 846 supplier implementation guide, November 7, 2025.
- SPS Commerce, Leslie’s Poolmart 846 Inventory Advice v4010, April 13, 2020.
- SPS Commerce, Sportsman’s Guide 846 v5010, August 7, 2017.
- SPS Commerce, JCPenney Factory Ship 846 v4030, August 7, 2016.
- Logicbroker (drop-ship platform vendor), 846 Inventory Inquiry/Advice guide v4010, November 2, 2021.
- Logicbroker, Home Depot, no date shown.
- Convictional (marketplace software vendor), Inventory Update (846) Specification, no date shown.
- SPS Commerce (EDI vendor), EDI 846 Inventory Inquiry/Advice, no date shown.
- SPS Commerce, Inventory Advice (Fulfillment help), May 20, 2026.
- SPS Commerce, Fulfillment EDI for Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central, no date shown.
- TrueCommerce (EDI vendor), NetSuite Integration Overview, May 5, 2025.
- TrueCommerce, Dynamics 365 Business Central documents integrated with Transaction Manager, November 30, 2023.
- Orderful (EDI vendor), All About EDI 846, January 15, 2026.
- Orderful, Inventory Advice (NetSuite), January 29, 2026.
- Celigo (integration vendor), Sync NetSuite inventory to Orderful inventory advice (EDI 846), no date shown.
- Oracle NetSuite, Committing Orders, no date shown.
- Oracle NetSuite, Available to Promise in Demand Planning, no date shown.
- Oracle NetSuite, Buffered Quantity (NetSuite Connector), no date shown.
- Microsoft, View the availability of items (Business Central), August 21, 2025.
- Extensiv (WMS vendor), Stock Status Report (3PL Warehouse Manager), September 11, 2025.
Sherman Hsieh
Independent analysis of enterprise software — ERP, CRM and more
