Table of contents
The Organizational Relationships transaction is a master data message used to share structured information about organizational hierarchies, relationships, and identifiers between trading partners. It defines how companies, business units, and locations relate to one another—such as parent–subsidiary, company–location, or owner–partner relationships—and includes key data such as names, addresses, contacts, and identifiers like GLNs, DUNS numbers, or internal codes.
The organizational relationship helps ensure that all operational transactions—such as purchase orders (POs), advance ship notices (ASNs), invoices, and chargebacks reference consistent and aligned entities across systems. By centralizing and standardizing this information, it eliminates the need to repeat full organizational details in every transaction, reducing manual entry, minimizing errors, and improving data accuracy throughout the supply chain.
The organizational relationship is sent by the trading partner that owns or manages the authoritative organizational master data—such as a retailer, manufacturer, Marketing Authorization Holder (MAH), distributor, 3PL, or a centralized master data hub. It is received by partners who must align to this structure, including contract manufacturers (CMOs), suppliers, wholesalers, and logistics providers. The direction of the transaction depends on who maintains the master data and who needs to adopt it, and it can flow in either direction based on the partnership context.
The organizational relationship is commonly exchanged during partner onboarding, data alignment efforts, or when there are updates to organizational structures, relationships, or address changes. To ensure smooth and accurate downstream processing, the transaction must follow the organizational relationship format, include all required identifiers and relationship types, and comply with partner-specific implementation guidelines. It must also be kept up to date to reflect current organizational structures.
By implementing the organizational relationship transaction, trading partners can streamline onboarding, improve transaction accuracy, reduce redundant data entry, and maintain alignment across interconnected systems—supporting operational efficiency and regulatory compliance.
