SKU stemming
Reducing a part number to a comparable core so distributor-specific variants match the contracted item.
Suppliers rarely bill the exact string you contracted. The same product arrives as ABC-1234, ABC1234, 1234-ABC/CS, or with a branch prefix and a pack suffix attached.
Stemming strips punctuation, casing, known prefixes and suffixes, and pack indicators to produce a stable key, then compares on that key. Family matching goes one step further and groups stems that differ only by a size, color or pack dimension so a near-miss can be surfaced for review rather than dropped.
Stemming should never silently overwrite a match. The right behavior is to propose the match with its evidence and let a person confirm it once, after which the alias is remembered for that supplier.
Related terms
- Unmatched reason — The classified explanation for why an invoice line could not be matched to a contracted price.
- Column mapping profile — A saved translation between one supplier's file layout and the fields the audit engine needs.
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