Getting Started

The Point of Sale (POS) integration guide includes extensive and reference materials to aid POS system's developers for integrating any POS system with CRM.COM Rewards platform, using a set of recommended Web API methods provided by CRM.COM

CRM.COM Rewards & POS Ecosystem

What is CRM.COM Rewards?

CRM.COM Rewards application is designed to cover any business operations that aim to identify and award their loyal customers, via numerous reward offers. Such offers award loyal customers with conditional (or not) cashback that can be consumed on specific products, units (different merchant' stores), and specific days/hours or at the customer's discretion (with no conditions) without having any dedicated operations on the POS side (awards are agnostic to the POS system) 

CRM.COM supports two reduction methods that define how the amount that is requested to be consumed (spend) by the customer will be reduced from the total amount that should be paid

• Front-End Reduction - The reduction is done by a front-end system (i.e. POS) by reducing the amount of money that the consumer should actually pay
• Back-End Reduction - The reduction is done is by a back-end system (i.e. PayPal) by letting the customer to pay for the full purchased amount and credit him through a payment gateway system or by generating a refund voucher

What is Point of Sale?

Point of Sale (POS) is the system that is used by an agent (cashier) to sell goods to a customer and collect the due amount in usually a face to face (over the counter) manner

Important Key Definitions

The following section lists a number of definitions that describe the key points in a POS & CRM.COM Rewards integration flow

How to integrate your POS system to CRM.COM

The steps bellow describe a common scenario how to integrate a POS system with CRM.COM Rewards

1. The customer is identified by the POS agent using a phone number, card number, or email address
2. Once identified, the agent is creating the customer's basket into the POS system by submitting all products to it

3. Prior closing the customer's basket, the POS agent can preview the behavior of the award and spend (automatic, instant, and additional) based on the customer's basket

4. The customer's basket is closed when the last intended product to be purchased is submitted in the POS and no other adjustments will be made (Point of no Return)
5. The itemized POS sales transaction is submitted to CRM.COM and the customer is awarded
   • CRM.COM awards the customer based on the purchased products (based on valid reward offers that are eligible for awarding such products)
6. The payment is completed by collecting the due amount for the purchased products
   • The due amount can be settled via any form of payment, such as cash, credit cards, spending awarded amount, or even a combination of these

The following diagram illustrates the integration architecture and key points

CRM.COM & POS Product Synchronization

CRM.COM Product Synchronization allows a POS system to add or update a group of products that exist in the POS with the ones in CRM.COM usually through a background batch process, resulting into creating new products or update existing ones (e.g. name, description, category) in the CRM.COM

What is a CRM.COM Product?

Products are physical goods that can be used by any type of business transaction within CRM.COM software. Products are classified into services and physical goods. They can be sold rented or simply used by customers through multiple business events such as subscriptions, jobs, activities, direct sales and can also be awarded to reward participants through rewards

In addition, Products in CRM.COM have a set of attributes (type, brand, family, categories) that are used to determine their operational characteristics, define trademarks and group products based on common physical characteristics

Product Type

Product Type is used to determine the operational characteristics of products, and classify a product as a physical good or a service and what kind of a good or service is (i.e. termed, usage, traceable, non-traceable). For POS integration purposes, all products should have a product type that classifies products as non-traceable physical goods

Product Brand

Product Brand is used to define trademarks or distinctive names that serve to identify a specific Product

Product Family

Product Family is used to group products that derive from a common product platform and have similar physical characteristics

Product Categories

Product Categories are used to classify products into generic groups based on specified shared attributes

Putting it all together

Now that we have laid out all product attributes, let's put them together and present a couple examples of Products in CRM.COM

How Product Synchronization between POS and CRM.COM works

Product Synchronization can be achieved using CRM.COM Web API methods that a POS system can call periodically in order to synchronize product information between POS and CRM.COM

The following diagram illustrates the integration architecture and key points

Setup and Integration

Prior proceeding to the integration implementation, let's walk through a few basic API concepts that will be required on each subsequently method

Setup and Integration

The following sections include extensive and reference materials to aid POS system's developers for integrating any POS system with CRM.COM Rewards platform, using a set of recommended Web API concepts and methods provided by CRM.COM

Configuration

Authentication

Before performing any logical unit of work, an authentication token must be acquired and subsequently will be used by all other Web API methods in order to access and performed any operations in the system. All API requests must be made using a valid authentication token, otherwise such requests will fail

Acquiring an authentication token can be accomplished by using one of the following methods

• Web API Key
• Username & Password

Recommended Authentication Method

The recommended method of authentication is using Web API Keys of a "System Key" classification. Web API Keys are assigned to specific users in order to access a specific organization and can be used to authenticate users through Web API, resulting to an authentication token that can subsequently be used by other Web API calls, without any data restrictions

The authentication Web API call that should be performed is POST authentication/web_api_key/token (based on HTTP Basic Auth)

Web API Key Method Example

Using Fields Set

CRM.COM Web APIs offer the ability to select the fields that will be retrieved from each API method by specifying the "fields_set" input parameter

Using this parameter developers have the ability to filter the response object and retrieve only the fields that will be used for the desired implementation. If "fields_set" is not specified, then all fields of the response will be retrieved

The "fields_set" attribute is used for each call throughout the entire integration guide

Using Pagination

There are some API methods that retrieve a large number of entities, such as list API methods. Some of these CRM.COM API methods provide the option to apply pagination on the results retrieved

In such cases the API call should be constructed using the following input parameters

• number_of_results: The number of results that can be retrieved through each call. The maximum number of results can be 50, and objects are returned in chronological order (oldest requests are retrieved fist)
• offset: Defines the number of entities that should be skipped from the results. During the first call it should be set to 0 and then it should be increased based on the number of results that were retrieved

Integration Scenarios

The flow described below is an example of a POS integration with CRM.COM Rewards

Award and Spend Flow

Step 1 - Customer Identification
No	Description	Web API Example	POS Conceptual Examples
1	The customer is identified on the POS system by providing an email address, a phone number, a card number, etc Identifying a customer in CRM.COM (also referred as rewards participant) should be performed using the POST rewards_participants/show method The following identification means can be used to identify a customer in CRM.COM number: A unique number that is related to each rewards participant access_token_identifier: An access token that is related to a rewards participant. An access token is the most common parameter to use for customer identification purpose, because it can be easily assigned to a rewards participant and usually is mapped to the customer's email address, phone number or card number	POST Request https://hostname/crmapi/rest/v2/rewards_participants/show Body Expand source { "token": "{{token}}", "rewards_participant_identifier":{ "access_token_identifier":{ "authentication_code": "22265577" } }, "fields_set": "accounts_receivable,wallet" }	Prior Customer Identification
2	Once a customer is identified in CRM.COM, then the full information of the customer is returned back to the POS system The following information can be displayed on the POS screen The name of the customer (accounts_receivable.account_owner.name) The available balance of the customer's wallet (wallet.balance)	Response Expand source { "data":{ "wallet": { "number": "W0000000001, "balance": "10.00", ... }, "accounts_receivable":{ "life_cycle_state": "ACTIVE", "number": "400", "name": "John Doe", "id": "123456789" "account_owner":{ "name": "John Doe", "first_name": "John" "last_name": "Doe", "life_cycle_state": "FINANCIAL", "title": "Mr", "type": "PERSON", ... }, ... } }, "status":{ "message": null, "description": null, "code": "OK" } }	After Customer Identification
Step 2 - Preview Award and Spend Information (Optional)
No	Description	Web API Example	POS Conceptual Examples
1	Prior completing the sales transaction on POS, customer may request to know their available balance and the amount that are eligible to spend on the related transaction. The preview method will determine whether the purchase customer event that will be submitted can be performed (spend) by the Front-End System (i.e. POS) or by a Back-End System Previewing such information should be performed using the POST customer_events/purchases/preview method, and the following information should be passed to CRM.COM The related customer (accounts_receivable_identifier) The sales transaction's reference number (reference_number) The sales transaction's date (performed_on) The sales transaction's merchant (performed_by_unit_identifier) The sales transaction's items and the amount per each item (products_set)	POST Request https://hostname/crmapi/rest/v2/customer_events/purchases/preview Body Expand source { "token": "{{token}}", "rewards_participant_identifier":{ "access_token_identifier":{ "authentication_code": "22265577" } }, "reference_number": "REF0001", "performed_by_unit_identifier":{ "name" : "Unit" }, "performed_on": "2017-06-22T15:00:00", "products_set":[ { "product_identifier":{ "code": "Soft Drinks" }, "quantity": 1, "total_amount": 10, "net_amount": 8, "vat_amount": 2 }, { "product_identifier":{ "code":"Sandwiches" }, "quantity": 10, "total_amount": 20, "net_amount": 26, "vat_amount": 4 } ], "fields_set": "total_additional_spend_amount, total_automatic_spend_amount,reduction_method, total_instant_spend_amount, total_award_amount" }	Not Applicable
2	Once performing such action is completed, the POS system can display the related award and spend amount information that are eligible for the current customer's basket products that were submitted to the POS The following information can be displayed on the POS screen The reduction method (reduction_method) The amount that will be spend automatically, without the customer's request (the sum of total_instant_spend_amount and total_automatic_spend_amount) The amount that is available to be spend on that transaction (total_additional_spend_amount) The amount to be awarded (total_award_amount)	Response Expand source { "data":{ "total_additional_spend_amount": 7.9, "total_automatic_spend_amount": 0, "total_instant_spend_amount": 0, "total_award_amount": 0.08, "reduction_method": "FRONT_END_REDUCTION" }, "status":{ "message": null, "description": null, "code": "OK" } }	After Preview
Step 3 - Submitting Sales Transaction and Award Customer
No	Description	Web API Example	POS Conceptual Example
1	Once all products are registered in the POS, the sales transaction should be submitted in CRM.COM in the form of a purchase customer event. Creating such customer event, CRM.COM will validate whether the purchased items are eligible to be awarded by a reward offer and credit the customer's wallet balance Submitting a purchase event in CRM.COM should be performed using the POST customer_events/purchases/create method, and capture the following information The related customer (accounts_receivable_identifier) The sales transaction's reference number (reference_number) The sales transaction's date (performed_on) The sales transaction's merchant (performed_by_unit_identifier) The sales transaction's items and the amount per each item (products_set) Whether the customer event should be processed immediately, depending various business processes or not (process_immediately) - in most cases processing is immediately Optionally, the identifier of the POS can be specified (external_system) Products should already exist in CRM.COM in order for the POS to make transactions for them. In the event that a POS integration requires to perform transactions for such items, CRM.COM provides the ability to allow such transaction submission using a default product (everything is handled by CRM.COM without additional changes from the POS system)	POST Request https://hostname/crmapi/rest/v2/customer_events/purchases/create Body Expand source { "token": "{{token}}", "accounts_receivable_identifier":{ "number": "001" }, "performed_by_unit_identifier":{ "name":"Unit" }, "performed_on":"2017-05-22T16:05:00", "process_immediately": true, "external_system": "POSID01", "reference_number":"REF00001", "products_set":[ { "product_identifier":{ "code": "Soft Drinks" }, "quantity": 1, "total_amount": 10, "net_amount": 8, "vat_amount": 2 }, { "product_identifier":{ "code": "Sandwiches" }, "quantity": 4, "total_amount": 10, "net_amount": 8, "vat_amount": 2 } ], "fields_set":"number,total_awarded_amount,reference_number" }	Not Applicable
2	Once the sales transaction submission is performed (purchase customer event creation), the POS system can proceed to the spend step The following information can be displayed on the POS screen The amount that was awarded from the purchase (total_award_amount) The amount that was automatically spend from the purchase (total_spend_amount) The available balance of the customer's wallet after the purchase (initial wallet balance + total_award_amount - total_spend_amount)	Response Expand source { "data":{ "number": "111", "total_awarded_amount": 20, "reference_number": "REF00001" }, "status":{ "message": null, "description": null, "code": "OK" } }	After Customer is Awarded
Step 4 - Spend Awarded Amount
No	Description	Web API Example	POS Conceptual Example
1	Customer may want to spend some of the available wallet amount Spending a specific or the full awarded amount can be achieved by submitting a spend customer event in CRM.COM The following information can be displayed on the POS spend request form The amount that can be requested to be spent on that transaction (total_additional_spend_amount) The minimum spend amount allowed to be spend per transaction (minimum_spend_amount_per_transaction) The maximum spend amount allowed to be spend per transaction (maximum_spend_amount_per_transaction) Submitting a spend request in CRM.COM should be performed using the POST customer_events/spend_requests/create method, and capture the following information The related customer (accounts_receivable_identifier) The related purchase customer event that was created above (purchase_customer_request_identifier) The amount that is requested to be spend (spend_amount) The sales transaction's date (performed_on) The sales transaction's merchant (performed_by_unit_identifier) Whether the customer event should be processed immediately, depending various business processes or not (process_immediately) - in most cases processing is immediately Optionally, the identifier of the POS can be specified (external_system)	POST Request https://hostname/crmapi/rest/v2/customer_events/spend_requests/create Body Expand source { "token": "{{token}}", "accounts_receivable_identifier":{ "number": "001" }, "performed_by_unit_identifier":{ "name": "Unit" }, "performed_on": "2017-05-12T11:41:00", "external_system": "POSID01", "process_immediately": true, "spend_amount": 10, "purchase_customer_request_identifier":{ "number": "936" }, "fields_set":"number, spend_amount, reduction_method, spend_reward_transaction" }	Spend Request Form
2	Once the spend request is performed, it will return back the actual amount that was spent, which might be different than the amount that was requested to be spend The following information will be used in the next step of reducing and closing the sales transactions The actual amount that was spent (spend_reward_transaction.total_amount)	Response Expand source { "data":{ "number": "294", "spend_amount": 10, "reduction_method": "FRONT_END_REDUCTION", "spend_reward_transaction":{ "number": "205", "total_number": 7.9, "net_amount": 7.9, "vat_amount": 0, "life_cycle_state": "POSTED", ... } }, "status":{ "message": null, "description": null, "code": "OK" } }	After Spend Request
Step 5 - Closing the sales transaction
No	Description	Web API Example	POS Conceptual Example
1	Once the sales transaction (purchase customer event) and spend transaction (spend request customer event) are submitted successfully , the POS system can calculate the total spend amount, reduce it from the total amount of the sales transactions, and close the sales transaction with the customer's payment The total spend amount is calculated as the sum of the following attributes The actual amount that was spent (spend_reward_transaction.total_amount), as retrieved from the "spend_request/create" method, and The amount that was spent automatically, which is the total_spend_amount as retrieved by the "purchases/create" method or from the sum of total_instant_spend_amount, total_additional_spend_amount and total_automatic_spend_amount as retrieved from the "purchases/preview" method The total_spend_amount is also the sum of total_instant_spend_amount, total_additional_spend_amount and total_automatic_spend_amount as retrieved by the "purchases/create"  (all these three values are retrieved from the same method as well) The calculated total spend amount is deducted from the POS sales transaction by applying a discount on the sales transaction Upon completion, the following information is displayed and printed on the customer's receipt The amount that was awarded from the purchase (total_award_amount retrieved by the "purchases/preview" or "purchases/create") The wallet balance after the purchase. The new balance is calculated as the wallet's initial balance + awarded amount - total spend amount	Not Applicable	Receipt

Amend Award and Spend Flow

https://hostname/crmapi/rest/v2/customer_events/purchases/list

{
	"token": "{{token}}",
	"rewards_participant_identifier":{
		"access_token_identifier":{
			"authentication_code": "22265577"
		}
	},
	"fields_set": "number, performed_on"
}

{
	"data":[
		{
			"number": "473",
			"performed_on": "2018-12-21T10:15:02"
		},
		{
			"number": "479",
			"performed_on": "2018-12-21T11:02:59"
		}
	],
	"status":{
		"message": null,
		"description": null,
		"code": "OK"
	}
}

https://hostname/crmapi/rest/v2/customer_events/purchases/cancel

{
	"token": "{{token}}",
	"customer_event_identifier":{
		"number":"479"
	},
 
	"fields_set": "number, life_cycle_state"
}

{
	"data":{
		"number": "479",
		"life_cycle_state": "CANCELLED"
	},
	"status":{
		"message": null,
		"description": null,
		"code": "OK"
	}
}

Product Synchronization Flow

The flow described below is an example of synchronizing products from a POS system into CRM.COM

 Product Synchronization can be achieved using existing CRM.COM Web API methods, where product information (as described previously) can be passed through a product parameter set

https://hostname/crmapi/rest/v2/products/synchronise

{
	"token": "{{token}}",
	"synchronisation_definition_identifier":{
		"alternative_code": "Product_Sync"
	},

	"products_set":[
		{
			"code" : "Orange Cookie",
			"alternative_code" : "10021",
			"description":"Cookie with orange cream",
		},
		{
			"code" : "Iced Caramel Latte",
			"alternative_code" : "20071",
			"description":"Latte with caramel syrup",
			"family_identifier" :{
				"code" : "Iced Coffee"
			}
		}
	],

	"fields_set":"unprocessed_products_set,processed_products_set"
}

{
	"data": {
		"unprocessed_products_set": [
			{
				"error_description": "Error:Product Family (Iced Coffee) Not Found. - Description:The specified API value was not found.",
				"error_code": "NotFoundAPIValueException",
				"request_code": "Iced Caramel Latte"
			}
		],
		"processed_products_set": [
			{
				"code": "Orange Cookie",
				"request_code": "Orange Cookie",
				"id": "E15E0F60F5D147B28C8FD50ADE4E0116"
			}
		]
	},
	"status":{
		"message": null,
		"description": null,
		"code": "OK"
	}
}

Additional Documentation

Visit CRM.COM Manual in order to find more information related to the areas / concepts mentioned in above scenarios