In the first part of the article “B2B features of your ePages shop” we took a look at the possibilities how to make customers individual offerings by using your ePages online shop. The second part of the article deals with handling gross/net-VAT, how to make it easier for your business clients to set orders by using the order form and shopping lists and what you can do to connect your ePages shop to ERP and CRM software of your choice.

Gross/net – VAT in your ePages shop

Do you want to use gross- or net-prices? Or do you prefer to present net gross prices only to particular customers. Your ePages online shop gives you a choice of tax models.

To change the tax model for the whole shop, choose the „Settings/Tax calculation” menu item. Choose the “Tax model” tab.

If you wish to exclude particular customers from viewing/paying VAT, you can do this individually. Change to the “Customers/Customers” menu item and click on the desired customer number from the list. In the “General”-tab, click on the “Customer account” link. Here you will find the various business-oriented settings for the customer, including the choice of tax model, as described above.

Simplified ordering via order forms and shopping lists

Especially useful features for business customers are those that simplify ordering and re-ordering. Your shop has two features to assist with this.

Ordering via an order form:

There is a link to the standard order form from the “shopping basket overview with product line items box”. A simple link to the order form can also be assigned to any navigation bar in the “Design” menu. You can add up to 10 products into the order form by entering their product numbers and amounts.

If you want to add a separate link to the order form page, go to either the menu item “Quick design” or “Advanced design”. Click on the button to “Insert page element” at the desired location. In the resulting list, choose the “Shopping basket and order” group, and then the entry called “Link to order form”.

Ordering from shopping lists:

If your customer regularly re-orders the same group of products, he can do this with just a mouse-click, using shopping lists. To do this, he just needs to save an existing order  as a shopping list for later visits. This can be done directly from any basket page, or from the customer’s “My account” list of old orders. If, later, a re-order is necessary, he can click on the link to “Manage shopping lists” in his “My account” page, and re-order any shopping list. This allows bulk ordering with just a mouse click.

Connecting third-party systems via web services

Last but not least, we have designed new shop products especially for B2B online merchants, ePages Flex and ePages for SAP Business One.

With ePages Flex, you get an inexpensive rental shop on a virtual dedicated server, with activated web services. These web services allow you to connect any desired third-party systems to the ePages shop. Extend your shop functionality via a connection to a CRM system, an ERP system or any other financial system. With ePages Flex, it’s all possible.

Our second new product, ePages for SAP Business One, is aimed at companies using the SAP Business One ERP system, who want a simple and economical start in E-Commerce. The inexpensive rental shop is pre-configured with a connector to SAP Business One.

Do you want to know more about ePages Flex and ePAges for SAP Business One? Our sales team would be pleased to advise you at sales@epages.com or on the phone at +49-40-350 188-0

Business customers with a valid Value-added tax identification number are entitled to pay without VAT in domestic Europe. But can these business customers be differentiated from normal consumers in the shop? Can gross or net prices be paid depending on the customer? With ePages 6, this is set up quickly and easily. We’ll show you how it works.*

Tax is a complex topic which we shall not delve deeper into at this point. You simply need to know that foreign business customers are entitled to pay net prices instead of gross prices within your shop and that the ePages system automatically detects whether this is actually permitted or not.

Here’s how to do it:

1. Select Tax Model

To allow gross and net prices to be displayed in the shop, the tax model needs to be determined first. Sign in to the administration area of your shop and click on the menu items Settings -> Tax calculation -> Tax model. If the Gross price option is not selected, click on the radio button and save your settings.

2. Registering Customers

A customer account is required for assigning net prices. Please ask your customers to register in your shop or register them yourself. If you would like to carry out a registration, go to the Customers menu in the administration area and select the option New. Now enter all the customer information that you have available. What is particularly important here is the setting of the tax model and the input of the customer’s Value-added tax identification number (VAT ID/UID). More on this to come.

3. Allowing Net Prices

Customers who would like to pay net prices must identify themselves as business customers, which is done using a valid VAT identification number. This number can be queried directly during the customer registration process in the shop. To do this, activate the VAT ID checkbox under Settings -> User management -> Registration. If you do not have a VAT ID for the customer, please ask the customer to provide you with it.

Once you have the number, enter it in the text field provided in the Customers -> Customer account area. You can check whether the ID is valid by clicking on the Verify button to the right. Now activate Net as tax model.

Since you have specified Gross as tax model in the basic settings, both prices (gross and net) are always stated in the shop. When your newly created business customer now logs into the shop, this customer will only see net prices. All prices will be converted accordingly even if this customer does not log in until the shopping basket. Naturally, net prices can also be shown to a domestic business customer. But since this customer is not entitled to pay without VAT, gross prices will still automatically be billed.

Optional: Customer Group "Business Customers"

In order to keep an overview of your business customers, you can also assign a Customer group of the same name. You create customer groups under the main navigation item Customers as well. The assignment of customers to customer groups is then done in the Customer account.
Another advantage of customer groups is, for example, that you can set individual prices for them. This allows you to apply a special sale price (e.g. "10% discount on all trousers") to your business customers only. You can read more in the article "Running promotional campaigns".
 
* In shops based on the ePages 5 product version, this option is not available. Read our "Online shops and business websites with ePages 6" article again to get to know the fundamental differences between both product versions.