Why this door hardware manufacturer automated Amazon FBA with Business Central Bob’s Industry Insights #7

A German door hardware manufacturer recently reached out about connecting Amazon to Business Central. They produce and sell door handles, glass drawers, and sliding door systems, operating mostly in the DACH region with some presence in Eastern Europe.

Like many mid-sized manufacturers in their space, they’d watched traditional wholesale channels lose ground year after year. Amazon represented a way to reclaim some of that market share. The question wasn’t whether to sell there, it was how to do it without creating operational chaos.

From Navision 2009 to the cloud

Until about a year ago, they were running on Navision 2009. Getting any kind of modern integration to work on top of that wasn’t realistic. The cloud migration changed things entirely. Once Business Central was in place, the conversation about connecting Amazon could finally happen.

It’s a pattern we see often. The ERP upgrade is the enabler. Without it, any integration conversation is premature.

Why they didn’t integrate from day one

When they first started testing Amazon in mid-2024, the volumes were tiny — five orders between August and December. The technical lead made the right call: prove the concept commercially first, then automate. There’s no point in integrating a process that doesn’t exist at scale yet.

By early 2026, the CEO was asking for a proper technical setup. The proof of concept had done its job. Now it was time to build something reliable.

What they actually needed from an Amazon connector

The requirements were straightforward:

• FBA to start, with FBM as a possible next step
• Orders flowing into Business Central without manual intervention
• Inventory reflecting Amazon sales in real time
• Fee reconciliation that didn’t require the finance team to chase numbers
• Compliance with German invoicing and VAT rules

Nothing exotic. But all of it needs to work cleanly, in the background, without daily babysitting.

How FBA orders land in Business Central

For FBA, Amazon handles the physical fulfillment entirely. That changes what Business Central actually needs to do. Rather than running through the full sales order and shipment flow, the connector skips straight to invoice creation.

Each time Amazon marks an order as shipped, an invoice is created automatically in Business Central. The stock at the dedicated Amazon warehouse location is reduced immediately. No one touches the system. Finance sees accurate revenue. Inventory reflects reality.

The simplicity is intentional. Since Amazon does the warehouse work, mirroring all of that inside Business Central would just be overhead.

Handling Amazon fees and reconciliation

Amazon’s settlement reports, which typically arrive every two weeks, contain all the fee information broken down per order. The connector downloads those reports and posts the fees directly to the general ledger, linked to the relevant invoices.

When the Amazon payout arrives, everything already lines up. The open invoices, the deducted fees, the incoming payment — it all reconciles with a single click. No retroactive corrections, no manual matching, no end-of-month surprises.

A known gap: sending stock to Amazon

One area that came up honestly: proactively notifying Amazon about incoming stock shipments from the manufacturer’s own warehouse isn’t currently part of the connector.

The physical transfer itself — creating a warehouse movement in Business Central — is standard functionality. But the step of pushing that inbound notification to Amazon’s system isn’t automated yet. It’s a gap that’s been requested occasionally, but not frequently enough to have been prioritised.

For this particular company, starting with FBA meant Amazon already held the stock. That gap didn’t block anything. But it’s worth knowing going in.

German VAT compliance, handled

German invoicing requirements are strict, and Amazon’s own invoicing doesn’t always satisfy them. A feature currently being added to the connector allows the Business Central PDF invoice to be sent directly to Amazon, so that both platforms show the same invoice. That removes the risk of duplicate VAT liability when the auditors come around.

For any company selling on Amazon.de and managing their books in Business Central, this matters.

What the onboarding looks like

For a straightforward FBA setup, a full implementation project is usually overkill. The workshop format — a few remote sessions spread across a couple of afternoons, covers the essentials: how orders flow in, how settlements are handled, how VAT is configured, and how inventory locations are set up. From signing to go-live typically takes a matter of weeks.

The investment is in the range of one to two days of consulting time. For a setup this focused, that’s enough.

Starting to sell on Amazon from Germany and running Business Central?

If you want Amazon orders, fees, and payouts to land in Business Central automatically, and your invoices to comply with German requirements; the connector is built for exactly that.

👉 Schedule a demo or introduction call to see how it works in practice.