Supplier: How do I hide a product from a buyer(s)?

AD team Updated by AD team

How to hide a product(s) from a buyer

The below instructions cover how to hide an item from a buyer's marketplace so that it cannot be purchased, but which allows you to bring it back in the future if you wish. If you need to permanently delete items from the system, please follow the deletion process instead.

The hide process can be used in a number of scenarios, such as where:

  • you need to temporarily remove an item from view (e.g. if no stock available)
  • you need to remove an item from a certain buyer(s) but maintain the product for a number of other customers
Please note that you can hide an item(s) as part of a normal price update too
If you ever need to 'unhide' a product, you can do so by uploading a price for it.

Download and complete a price template

  1. Select the Catalogue Management tab from the left navigation menu of the supplier portal
  2. Click the Upload button > Prices > Generate Unit Price Template > Download
  3. In the spreadsheet, input the relevant catalogue numbers that need to be hidden in Column A ('Catalogue Number')
  4. Where you would normally insert the price, input the word 'HIDE' in the relevant buyer(s) price column instead
  5. If applicable, delete all other buyer price columns where no change needs to be made. Please ensure that no other columns or cells are left blank:
  1. Save your file in any of the following formats .csv, .xls or .xlsx
  2. Go to Catalogue Management
  3. Click Upload > Prices
  4. In the local file to upload field select Choose a file, and add the saved hide file
  5. Click Submit
  6. You can check the status of your upload on the Catalogue Management tab. Uploads highlighted in green have been successful, while those in red have failed. Please find details further below as to why a hide file may have failed.
  7. Once successfully uploaded, the hide file will need to be approved. To do this, please go to Price Approval via the button against the upload OR by selecting the Price Approval tab from the navigation menu.
    1. For more details you can follow the Price Approval guide here.
  • Please note that only one approval stage is required for hide files. Once completed, the items will then be hidden as soon as the system refreshes
  • When completing the approval of the HIDE file, you can download the 'show removed items' report which will list all items due to be hidden. Please be aware that the report will show the items as they are before removal e.g. the price of the item(s)
  • If you wish to schedule a release date for the removal of the uploaded hide items, please note that this is possible. You would need to follow the same process as normal (available on the Price Approval guide linked above)

Why has a hide file failed?

To view the reason for an update failing, in the Catalogue Management tab locate the relevant upload in the status table and select the blue View Job button. This will allow you to drill down into the job and show more details including the reason for failure.

As part of the upload process, our system does attempt to fix the data so that it can be successfully uploaded on first attempt, but there are occasions where this is not possible.

Common reasons why a hide file has failed:
  • Incorrect file format - your file must be .xls, .xlsx or .csv
  • Products don't exist - you can only hide items that have been loaded successfully into your catalogue previously. The portal will fail any files that contain items that do not exist in the current catalogue.
  • Conflicting pending price files - the portal will not allow you to apply new pricing (this includes making an item hidden) for items that are part of a pending price update already and will fail any price/hide files in full if they contain such items. You should either approve / reject the pending file as required, OR if the price file is 'pending buyer approval', please contact our Customer Support team to reject the file on your behalf so you can then upload your new hide file.
  • Pricing of 0.00 or left blank - pricing can only be uploaded as numerical values or one of the following: HIDE, POA (price on application) or FOC (free of charge). Zero (0) or blank pricing cells will cause the full price file to be rejected by the portal.
  • Blank pricing columns - delete any buyer pricing columns for buyers where you do not wish to update their pricing / hide items for.
  • Duplicate products - the portal cannot accept duplicate catalogue numbers in files and this will cause the hide file to fail
  • Amended or additional column headers - only use the column headers provided, and do not amend these, as the system needs to match to the headers exactly.

How did we do?

UNSPSC Version Update Guide

Supplier: How do I amend catalogue pricing?

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