About supplier notifications for event-related information
Depending on how your organization has configured the Supplier Portal on Supplier Group, suppliers who are registered or unregistered can browse the Supplier Portal for open events at any time. For registered suppliers, e-mail notifications are sent when:
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a login is created for the primary contact
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an event is released that lists the supplier contact on the Notifications tab
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an event is amended (if your organization notifies suppliers of amendments)
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a supplier question is answered by a buyer
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an event is awarded that a supplier was originally notified of or submitted a response to
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an event is cancelled that a supplier was originally notified of or submitted a response to
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output is being prepared for the winning supplier (if your organization notifies winning suppliers)
If a supplier e-mail notification fails, the system sends a failure notification to the event buyer or, if unavailable, to the administration e-mail defined for the sourcing company (if different from the sourcing group.)
About commodity codes
During supplier group setup, the Require Commodity Code value is used to determine if the registration process requires supplier contacts to have at least one commodity code on their record. In addition, the Registration Level value is used to determine the commodity code level for which a supplier can register. The table shown below contains an example of an NIGP commodity code structure with four levels:
| Code structure | Sample code | Sample description |
| 3-digit (class) code | 620 | Office supplies: erasers, inks, leads, pens, pencils, etc. |
| 5-digit (class-item) code | 620-80 | Pens: ball point, nylon tip, etc. |
| 7-digit (class-item-group) code | 620-80-21 | Pens: ball point, retractable, refillable, all plastic barrel with metal pocket clip |
| 11-digit (class-item-group-detail) code | 620-80-21-035-4 | Fine point, black ink, 12/box |
| 620-80-21-045-3 | Fine point, blue ink, 12/box | |
| 620-80-21-065-1 | Fine point, green ink, 12/box | |
| 620-80-21-075-0 | Fine point, red ink, 12/box | |
| 620-80-21-095-8 | Medium point, black ink, 12/box | |
| 620-80-21-105-5 | Medium point, blue ink, 12/box |
Suppliers receive a notification for each item that contains the commodity code that they entered.
If a supplier registers only at the highest commodity code level, they may receive numerous e-mail notifications for items that do not relate to their business. If too many commodity code levels are presented to a supplier, they may assume that they need to sort through thousands of NIGP codes to register. In addition, as commodity codes change and evolve, the supplier registration and notification process may contain inaccurate information.