Price and stock of a supplier product

When a supplier is connected with its API key (Hocoparts), Mekaplus reads your prices and the stock of its products on demand, when you open a product page. This page describes that page; the key is entered in Suppliers.

The product page requires the permission to view the catalog.

Find a product

In the Catalog, the Search tab also offers the products of connected suppliers. Each supplier product row shows its picture (or a neutral tile when the supplier gives none or it fails to load), the supplier name, the designation, the brand, the price and the availability. For a Hocoparts product, the View the page button opens its page.

The product page

• The Price card gives your purchase price excl. VAT (that of your account, discounts included), the recommended retail price incl. VAT, and its age: “Updated 3 hr. ago” (hover it to see the exact date and time, garage time). Without the permission to see purchase prices, only the retail price is shown.
• The Stock card gives the quantity at the supplier (“4 in stock” or “At least 10 in stock” when the supplier only states a minimum), the restocking date when one is announced, and the age of the information. At Hocoparts, the stock is read for the whole brand, page by page: for a large brand, it may take a few minutes to arrive.
• The Product card shows the picture, the reference, the brand, the type and the EAN.
• The Supplier details card, when there is one, lists read-only the other fields the supplier provides: group, family, old part number, description, and so on.

The price shown is the one stored for your garage: opening the page never contacts the supplier while you wait. If the price or the stock is missing or old, Mekaplus starts reading it in the background.

Price and stock states

A badge, in the Price card and likewise in the Stock card, tells where the value stands:

• Fetching the price (stock: Fetching the stock): no value has been read yet for this product; the read is started. A turning indicator, “Reading the price from the supplier…” (or the stock), stands in place of the value. The page updates by itself once it ends.
• Update in progress: an older value stays shown, with its age; its read is under way. The badge pulses and a small indicator turns under the value while the read lasts.
• Stock not provided by the supplier.: the read succeeded, but the supplier gives no stock for this reference; the date of the read is shown.
• Old price (Old stock): the value shown is old and no read is under way (see the reason below).
• Read failed: the read did not succeed or exceeded its time limit. The page stops waiting: it shows “Try again later.”, with the reason when known. The last known value stays shown, with its age.
• No badge: the value is up to date.

For Hocoparts, which computes the prices of a whole brand, the Price card adds “The brand’s prices are being computed at Hocoparts” with the estimated duration (“under a minute” or “about 3 min”).

Under the price, a message explains, when relevant, why it is not up to date:

• Supplier temporarily unavailable: Mekaplus cannot read the supplier for now (reads suspended, retry delayed after a failure). The last known price stays shown, with its age.
• Daily limit of price updates reached: to spare the supplier, Mekaplus limits the number of price reads per day and per garage; the stored price stays shown and updates resume the next day.
• Key refused, expired or not checked yet: correct the key on the supplier’s page (see Suppliers).

The page updates by itself when a read ends, and again after a connection drop: there is nothing to refresh.

The price of a quote line

When you add a part from a connected supplier to a work order, its price is re-checked if it is old. A line whose check is not finished shows “Price being checked”; if it fails, “Price not verified”. See Work orders.