Compliance Audit Worksheet

Working Through the Worksheet: What to Check and Why

A compliance audit for barcoding and EDI is mostly about evidence: can you show that what you label, scan and transmit matches what your trading partners require? Working through the checks below in order helps you find gaps before a retailer chargeback or a failed partner certification finds them for you.

Barcode and label checks

• Identifier integrity: confirm your GTINs and SSCCs are issued under your own GS1 company prefix and are not reused across different products or shipments.
• Print quality: verify a sample of labels with a barcode verifier, not just a scanner. A label can scan on the dock and still fall below the grade a partner specifies.
• Label layout: compare shipping labels against each partner's routing guide. Check the zones, human-readable text and the position on the carton.
• Change control: record who can edit label templates and when the last change was approved.

EDI transaction checks

• Document coverage: list every transaction set you exchange with each partner, such as 850 purchase orders, 856 advance ship notices and 810 invoices, and the version each one uses.
• Acknowledgements: confirm functional acknowledgements (997 or 999) are sent and received, and that rejections are followed up and not left in a queue.
• ASN accuracy: test whether ASN contents match the physical cartons and their SSCC labels. A mismatch here is a common source of compliance penalties.
• Timing: measure whether documents go out inside the windows your partners set.

SLA and record-keeping checks

Keep a simple log of incidents, response times and fixes for each partner. When a dispute comes up, a dated record of what failed and how it was fixed is worth more than anyone's memory. Review the log every quarter and flag any recurring errors. These usually point to a process problem, not a one-off mistake.

When the worksheet is done, rank your gaps by how much they cost you in money or partner goodwill, and deal with those first. For more help, see the solutions overview or browse further material in Resources.