Many of our clients agree that there is no way they could bring their EDI services back in house with the level of attention to detail and service that Promethean provides for anywhere near the same cost.
Understanding Managed EDI Services
Within the past year or so, almost every EDI provider in the industry has begun to offer a managed EDI solution.
As an information technology executive and professional, you pride yourself and your staff on the ability to evaluate technical specifications, functions and stability on any new software, hardware or communications protocol you come across. Not so fast. When it comes to managed EDI services, technical capability is only a small part of the evaluation criteria of a credible managed EDI solution.
We have found that, without prompting and guidance, virtually every one of our customers limited their evaluation to simply discovering the capabilities with translation of EDI documents and transmitting EDI data. The fact is there are many more considerations to discover and understand, such as the interoperability of systems, simultaneous processing requirements and custom business processes unique to each customer.
From listening to the experiences our customers have had with other managed EDI service providers – before they engaged Promethean – we have learned that our competitors continue to try to retrofit older networks, software and support methodologies to the unique demands required of a custom managed EDI solution. That spells trouble.
The fact is that roughly 75 percent of all EDI is the same for everyone. The other 25 percent is unique to each customer. How well that unique segment is handled will make or break your venture into managed EDI services if not accounted for correctly.
We recommend that you read the next two sections, Insider Facts on what has happened in the EDI industry over the last year or so and 12-Step selection criteria for choosing a managed EDI provider.