Understanding automatic supplier/customer matching logic

Zudello saves you time by automatically identifying and linking incoming documents to the correct supplier (for purchasing/expenses) or customer (for sales) records in your system. Understanding how this matching works helps troubleshoot issues and ensure accurate data association.

Best practices

• Maintain accurate and unique data in your supplier/customer records (name, tax number, email, phone).
• Keep supplier/customer alternatives up-to-date for known variations.
• Ensure document extraction quality is high for reliable matching.

The matching process (enrichment)

When a document is processed (e.g., after extraction), Zudello's enrichment service attempts to link it to a supplier or customer record using the following sequence:

1. Tax number match

   • Zudello compares the tax number (ABN, NZBN, or simmilar) extracted from the document against the tax number field stored in your supplier/customer records.
   • Comparison ignores symbols and spaces (e.g., "54 634 849 755" on the document will match "54634849755" in the record).
   • If an exact match is found, the corresponding supplier/customer is linked.

2. Email match

   • If no match was found via tax number, Zudello compares the company email extracted from the document against the email addresses stored in your supplier/customer records.
   • For documents received via email, it also checks the sender's email address against supplier/customer records.
   • Comparison ignores spaces.
   • If a match is found, the corresponding supplier/customer is linked.

3. Phone number match

   • If no match was found yet, Zudello compares the company phone number extracted from the document against the phone numbers stored in your supplier/customer records.
   • Comparison ignores symbols and spaces.
   • If a match is found, the corresponding supplier/customer is linked.

4. Name match

   • If still no match, Zudello compares the company name extracted from the document against both the legal name and trading name fields in your supplier/customer records.
   • This match is case-insensitive but is generally the least reliable due to potential variations in names (e.g., "Pty Ltd" vs "Pty Limited", OCR errors).
   • If a match is found, the corresponding supplier/customer is linked.

5. Supplier/Customer alternatives

   • If none of the above direct matches work, Zudello checks the supplier alternatives or customer alternatives table.
   • This table stores previously established links where a user manually matched a document with specific extracted details (name, tax number, email, phone) to a particular supplier/customer record.
   • If the current document's extracted details match a stored alternative record, Zudello links the corresponding supplier/customer. See Applying trained rules (which leverages this mechanism).

Important considerations

• Order matters
  • The matching process stops as soon as the first successful match is found (following the sequence above).
• Module context
  • Matching is filtered by the document's module context. Purchasing and expense documents only search Supplier records, while sales documents only search Customer records.
• Data quality
  • The accuracy of automatic matching heavily depends on the quality of both the extracted document data and the data maintained in your supplier/customer records.
• Manual override
  • If automatic matching fails or links the wrong record, users can always manually select the correct supplier/customer from the document viewer. Manually linking and completing the document often creates a supplier/customer alternative for future automation.

Troubleshooting matching issues

• No Match
  • Check the extracted details (company name, company tax, etc.) on the document viewer against the corresponding supplier/customer record in Zudello. Ensure the data exists and is accurate in the supplier/customer record. Consider adding an alternative if variations are common.
• Incorrect Match
  • Review the extracted details and compare them against both the incorrectly matched record and the correct record. The incorrect match likely occurred higher up in the matching sequence (e.g., a shared tax number or phone number). Manually select the correct record; this may create an alternative to improve future matching.

Need help?

Contact your organisation administrator or Zudello support if you consistently experience issues with automatic supplier/customer matching.