3 real Xentral Flows: Practical examples that save your team hours every day

Why do workflows, not new tools, give you the biggest leverage? 

There's a small mental slip that trips up plenty of teams when they try to optimize their processes: instead of improving how they work, they keep improving their tools. A new shipping tool, better warehouse software, another dashboard. And still, someone sits down every morning and copies data from A to B.

The real fix is the step in between: you need a reliable workflow.

Xentral Flows tap directly into your ERP data, with no middleware, no API round-trip, and no external dependency. A workflow in Xentral already knows the stock level, the payment status, the customer group, and the channel origin of an order. It doesn't have to fetch that information from somewhere else, it has it at hand at any moment.

That's the structural difference from external automation tools: ERP automation only runs smoothly day to day when the workflows live inside the system, not between systems.

What's the difference between Xentral Flows and Xentral AI agents, in short? 

Xentral Flows are rule-based if-then automations in the ERP for retail: a defined trigger sets off a defined action.

AI agents in Xentral analyze incoming information (like a support email) and prepare a response or action, without needing a fixed trigger. Flows are ideal for recurring, clearly defined processes. AI agents step in where context and interpretation matter.

Workflow 1: Automatically generate the shipping label after packing 

One of the most common friction points in warehouse operations: the step between packing and shipping is manual. That's where delays and errors happen.

The problem 

Your warehouse team packs an order. They set it aside and then have to manually switch over to the ERP. They look up the order, set the status to "packed," and request the shipping label. Three steps that have nothing to do with the actual packing. At 200 orders a day, that adds up to hours.

That's where errors creep in. An order gets packed, but the label gets forgotten. The package sits in the warehouse while the customer waits.

The workflow logic 

• Trigger: Order status changes to "packed."
• Action: Xentral automatically generates the shipping label with the configured shipping provider and assigns it to the order.
• Parameters: Shipping method and provider are pulled from the order rules. No manual selection needed.

This workflow is available in the Xentral workflow library as a prebuilt template, ready to activate with zero configuration effort. The guided setup process in the library walks you through activating the workflow step by step in the ERP.

The result 

• No manual step between packing and label generation.
• The "forgotten label" error is structurally eliminated.
• Your warehouse team works faster because one system switch is gone.

Workflow 2: Cancel unpaid prepayment orders with a rule 

Open prepayment orders are silent inventory killers: they lock up warehouse space and distort your booking situation. Too often they stay unnoticed for too long.

The problem 

Prepayment orders that don't get paid tie up your inventory. The item is reserved but not actually available to other customers or channels. If you monitor this manually, someone checks a list every day, hunts down overdue orders, and cancels them one by one. That takes time, and it doesn't always happen consistently.

The result: inventory that's spoken for on paper but physically sitting on the shelf, and bookings that don't match reality. Automatic inventory sync via a workflow solves this without anyone having to step in daily.

The workflow logic 

• Trigger: No payment received; deadline of X days after the order was placed has passed (configurable, e.g. 7 days).
• Condition: Payment method = prepayment, payment status = open.
• Action: The order is automatically canceled from day X, the inventory is released, and optionally a cancellation confirmation is sent to the customer.
• Parameters: The deadline, payment method, and cancellation reason are freely configurable.

The result 

• Your inventory is accurate at all times. No phantom reservations.
• Your booking quality improves because open orders don't sit artificially in the pipeline.
• Your operations team saves the daily manual check entirely.

A retailer with a 20% prepayment share and 150 orders a day has on average 30 orders that need to be reviewed each week. This workflow handles all of it, and nobody has to open a list.

Workflow 3: Automatically assign B2B customers to the right customer group 

Anyone serving B2B and B2C customers side by side knows the scenario: new business customers accidentally end up in the wrong price group, and nobody catches it fast enough.

The problem 

A new business customer creates an account. But at first, they see consumer prices and don't get any volume discounts.

Eventually someone on the team happens to notice and has to manually move the business customer into the right customer group. By that point, though, the customer may have already placed an order at the wrong prices.

The workflow logic 

• Trigger: A new customer is created or an order comes in.
• Condition: Customer data contains a required field that indicates B2B, e.g. a registered VAT ID, a specific email domain, or a manually set attribute.
• Action: The customer is automatically assigned to the defined B2B customer group, including the associated price list, payment terms, and discount logic.
• Parameters: The detection criterion, target customer group, and associated price list are configurable.

The result 

• Every new B2B customer gets the correct prices immediately, with no manual follow-up.
• Orders miscalculated because of a wrong customer group are gone.
• Scalability: Whether it's 10 or 1,000 new B2B customers a month, the process runs the same way every time.

A company onboarding 50 new B2B customers a month saves the manual check and assignment for every single record with this workflow. At 5 minutes per customer, that's over 4 hours a month for this one step alone.

That's the core of no-code workflow automation in a mid-market ERP: processes you set up once, and they just run.

Build your own workflows with the Flow Editor 

The three workflows above are examples from the Xentral workflow library, which holds around 70 prebuilt templates that every customer can activate for free. Among them, you'll find:

• Workflows to automate order fulfillment in your ERP
• Workflows for invoice generation in your ERP
• Workflows to automate dunning and payment reminders

If you want to go further and build your own if-then logic, you can do that with the Xentral Flow Editor. It's a no-code interface inside the ERP where you assemble triggers, conditions, and actions by drag and drop. The Flow Editor is available now.

What can the Flow Editor do: 

• Define your own triggers (status change, time interval, data field change)
• Nest conditions (if A and B, then C, otherwise D)
• Combine actions (status change + notification + data field update in one step)
• Test flows before they go live

Who it's for: The Flow Editor is built for users with a technical inclination. You don't need to know how to code, but you should understand how your processes are structured.

If you'd rather have a custom workflow built for you by the Xentral Solution Engineering team or a certified partner, you can commission that instead.

Availability and cost: The Flow Editor is included in every software package: Starter, Business, Pro, and Scale. It runs on Xentral Credits, the standard usage unit for Flows, Connect jobs, and API calls.

How many credits are included in your plan, and what happens if you go over, depends on which service package you're on (Standard, Growth, or Premium). Library workflows are free to use for every customer.

The bottom line: Automation starts with your first workflow 

Three workflows, three concrete problems, three measurable results. Day-to-day ERP automation isn't a massive strategy project. It's a concrete step you can take today. If you want to cut the time your team spends on manual work in the ERP, the best move is to start with your first workflow.

Which workflow fits your operation? Take a look at the full Xentral workflow library, or let's find the biggest lever in your setup together.