EDI DESADV with D365 F&O: options to send a dispatch advice

A DESADV is the EDIFACT dispatch advice message that many retail and industrial customers require for each delivery. To send it from Dynamics 365 Finance & Operations, there are four families of options:

1. Produce the content in F&O (data entity, Electronic Reporting or X++ code) and hand EDIFACT translation and exchange to an external EDI layer.
2. Use Azure Logic Apps and its EDIFACT connector (encoding, decoding, trading partner agreements).
3. Use a partner EDI solution, integrated with F&O or as a managed service.
4. Build everything in X++: possible, but you then handle control numbers, acknowledgements and per-partner tracking yourself.

The right choice depends on the number of partners, volume and available skills, not only on the technology.

F&O must provide at least: shipment, packages and containers, lines, quantities, customer item and order references. Three ways:

• An export data entity (or a recurring export) that exposes this data to the EDI layer. See create and export a data entity with DMF.
• Electronic Reporting (ER): Microsoft's configurable tool for defining incoming and outgoing electronic document formats, with an intermediate data model and Excel-like formulas. It produces the file; partner and exchange management still need to be covered.
• A "shipment confirmed" business event that triggers the flow at the right moment. See custom business event.

The Azure Logic Apps EDIFACT connector provides EDIFACT encode and decode actions in a B2B workflow. According to Microsoft's documentation, the built-in version (Standard workflows) accepts a flat file as input and supports payloads up to 100 MB, but does not yet check duplicate control numbers on decode and does not handle interchanges with multiple transactions. Agreements and partners are defined in an integration account.

Benefit: you keep control of the Azure architecture. Constraint: you need Logic Apps skills and operational monitoring.

Vendors offer EDI solutions for F&O, on AppSource or as a managed service, with partner management, mappings and tracking. It is often the fastest route when partners are many. Compare message coverage (DESADV, ORDERS, INVOIC…), hosting model and cost per partner or per message.

All-X++ suits one or two stable partners. You then handle: the partner's exact format, interchange numbering, resends and acknowledgements (CONTRL), logging and recovery.

• Sending the DESADV before the shipment is really confirmed: the customer gets wrong information.
• Forgetting customer references (order number, item code) in the exported data.
• Underestimating rejection handling: a rejected DESADV must be fixable and resendable.
• Treating each partner as separate development instead of a common, configurable base.

Whatever the option, F&O must expose reliable shipment data at the right time. Skalp AI does not run external EDI flows, but it can generate the D365 F&O side of the interface (data entities, classes, parameters), delivered as a pull request to your Azure DevOps. See D365 F&O API interfaces and X++ logistics extensions, the bigger picture in building X++ without a consultant in 2026, and the Basic, Pro and Max plans (1 credit, ≈ €400 on Basic, €200 on Pro, consumed only when the code is generated).

• Microsoft Learn, "Exchange EDIFACT messages for B2B workflows in Azure Logic Apps", updated 11 Mar 2026, accessed 18 Oct 2026.
• Microsoft Learn, "Electronic reporting (ER) overview", updated 8 Apr 2026, accessed 18 Oct 2026.
• Microsoft Learn, "Integration between finance and operations apps and third-party services", updated 9 Mar 2026, accessed 18 Oct 2026.