bol.com User Guide
The bol.com plugin is a popular tool for e-commerce businesses. It integrates WooCommerce stores with Bol.com, one of the largest online marketplaces in the Netherlands and Belgium. Here’s a brief overview of its functionality:
Key Features
- Product Synchronization: Automatically syncs products from your WooCommerce store to Bol.com, including details like price, stock levels, and product descriptions.
- Order Management: Imports orders placed on Bol.com directly into WooCommerce, allowing you to manage everything from one place.
- Inventory Updates: Keeps track of stock changes in real-time across both platforms, preventing overselling.
- Shipping & Tracking: Automatically send shipping information and tracking details from WooCommerce to Bol.com when an order is completed.
- Pricing Tools: Offers dynamic pricing options, allowing you to adjust prices for different sales channels automatically.
- Product Variations: Supports product variations like size, color, and other attributes, ensuring all relevant data is properly synced.
- Automatic Updates: Regular updates to the plugin ensure compatibility with the latest versions of WooCommerce and Bol.com’s API.
Benefits
- Time Saver: Eliminates the need to manage two platforms manually, helping you focus on growing your business.
- Efficiency: Helps streamline sales and order fulfillment across multiple channels.
About bol.com
What is bol.com?
bol.com is a large online retailer in the Netherlands and Belgium. Aside from selling their own products to customers, they have also opened up their webshop for other online retailers. In other words, bol.com is a marketplace.
At the moment bol.com has over 45,000 sellers on its platform and a revenue of 2,8 billion euro. With that, bol.com is one of the biggest online retailers in the Benelux.
Before you start: create a bol.com retailer account
To be able to start selling on bol.com, you will first need to sign up for a bol.com retailer account. You can sign up for free via the website of bol.com.
It can take up to 5 business days before you receive a postal letter with a verification code. You should fill in that verification code, to complete your account registration. After this, you can immediately start selling via the bol.com marketplace.
Download, install & activate the plugin
Get a subscription
Before you can begin working with the plugin, you need a subscription. You can purchase one at woosa.com.
Download the plugin
After the subscription is purchased, you can now download the plugin. Please follow these steps:
- Log in to your Woosa account via app.woosa.com.
- Navigate to the Licenses tab in your dashboard.
- Locate Adyen for WooCommerce in your list of active products.
- Copy your license key (you will need this later to activate updates).
- Click Download to save the latest plugin ZIP file to your computer.
You do not need to extract the ZIP file.
Install & activate the plugin
Now that the plugin is downloaded, we can upload and install it on WordPress. Please follow these steps:
- Log in to your WordPress backend
- Go to the Plugins page
- On top of the page, click on Add new plugin
- Then click on Upload plugin
- Click on Choose file
- Locate the plugin in your files and click on Open
- Then, click on Install now
- Lastly, click on Activate plugin
Activate the plugin with your Woosa license key
Get your license key
After plugin installation, we must activate it with your Woosa license key, or else it won't work. Please follow these steps:
- Log in to your woosa.com account
- Go to the Licenses tab
- Look for the bol.com plugin, and copy the license key
Activate the plugin with your license key
Now that you have copied your license key, we can activate the plugin in your WordPress backend. Please follow these steps:
- Log in to your WordPress backend
- Click on Bol on your left navigation bar
- On that page, paste the license key in the license field
- Lastly, click on Activate
Authorize the plugin with your bol.com account
Next up, is authorizing the bol.com plugin in WooCommerce, with your bol.com account.
Create a Client ID & Secret in your bol.com account
First, we need to create a Client ID & Secret in your bol.com account. Please follow these steps:
- Log in to your bol.com retailer account
- Click on your company name and, then click on Settings
- Then, click on the dropdown menu Services
- Click on API Settings
Before we can create the API credentials that we need, you first need to assign a technical contact person. This is required in case bol.com has updated their API, or if there are any technical issues, they need to contact the technical contact person within your organization.
Simply fill in your name, email address, and phone number, and agree with their API Terms of Service.
Now we will create the Client ID & Secret credentials. Please follow these steps:
- Under the header, Client credentials voor de Retailer API, click on Create
- Fill in any name for the API user, then click on Create again
- The Client ID & Secret are now created
Authorize the plugin in WordPress
We will now use the API credentials created in the previous steps, to authorize the bol.com plugin in your WordPress backend. Please follow these steps:
- Log in to your WordPress backend
- Click on Bol on the left navigation bar
- Then, click on the Authorization tab
- Fill in the Client ID & Secret fields with the credentials created in the previous steps
- Lastly, click on the Click to authorize button below
General settings
The bol.com plugin offers a variety of options you can configure to your liking, let's go through them all. Each section represents a different tab in the plugin settings.
Dashboard
Important: any shop changes will change the shop's secret key. To fix this, contact our support team.
| Option name | Type | Explanation |
| License key | Input field | Fill in your Woosa license key, to activate the plugin |
| Debug mode | Enable/disable | Enable if you like to see advanced logs |
| Remove configuration | Enable/disable | Enable if you like to remove the plugin configuration after uninstalling |
| Shop secret key | Input field | This key is used to sign the requests to our servers |
| Resource usage | Dropdown | Define the usage of the server resources to get the best performance from the plugin |
Authorization
Important: these settings can only be adjusted if the plugin is unauthorized.
| Option name | Type | Explanation |
| Status | Authorized/unauthorized | Whether or not the plugin is authorized |
| Account label | Input field | Add a label to your bol.com account |
| Client ID | Input field | Specify the Client ID from your bol.com account |
| Client Secret | Input field | Specify the Client Secret from your bol.com account |
| Use WooCommerce price | Checkbox | Whether or not to use the default WooCommerce price when products are published. When this is enabled, you can fill in a price margin |
| Shipping cost | Input field | The shipping cost that will be added to the product price when published |
| Delivery time | Dropdown menu | Specify the delivery time |
Synchronization
Products
| Option name | Type | Explanation |
| Synchronize products | Enable/disable | Enable this if you want to automatically synchronize your shop's products with bol.com whenever a product is created, updated, trashed, or deleted |
| Pause trashed products | Enable/disable | Enable this if you want to pause the offer on bol.com when the product is moved to the trash in your shop. NOTE: This works only when "Synchronize products" is enabled |
| Preserve stock offset | Input field | Define a value that will be subtracted from the product stock. This will help to avoid selling out of stock products |
| Internal reference source | Dropdown menu | Choose the source of value to be used as the internal product reference |
| EAN source | Dropdown menu | Choose the source of value to be used as product EAN |
| Condition | Dropdown menu | Choose the product condition to use as the default |
| Fulfillment method | Dropdown menu | Choose which fulfillment method to use as the default |
Orders
| Option name | Type | Explanation |
| Import orders | Enable/disable | Enable this if you want to automatically import orders from bol.com into your shop |
| Include FBB orders | Enable/disable | Enable this if you want to include FBB orders in the order import. NOTE: This works only when Import orders is enabled |
| Disable processing order email | Enable/disable | Enable this if you want to disable the email that is received by the customer when the imported order has the status processing |
| Disable completed order email | Enable/disable | Enable this if you want to disable the email that is received by the customer when the imported order has the status completed |
| Use my shipping carrier | Enable/disable | Enable this if you want to use your own shipping carrier |
| Shipping carrier | Dropdown menu | Choose which shipping carrier to use as the default. NOTE: This works only when Use my shipping carrier is enabled |
| Tracking code source | Input field | Define the order meta key where the tracking code is added by your 3rd-party shipping plugin. NOTE: This works only when Use my shipping carrier is enabled |
| Address format | Dropdown menu | Choose which address format to use for the imported orders |
Product bulk actions
Publish a product
To start the synchronization of a product between WooCommerce & Bol.com, you need to publish it first. Please follow these steps:
- Go to your WordPress backend
- Click on the Products tab on the left navigation bar
- Select the product you like to publish to bol.com
- Go to Bulk actions and click on Bol: Publish/update
- Lastly, click on Apply
The first status the product will have in WooCommerce is Processing and after a few minutes Published.
Important: do you get an Error? Go to the product editing page, scroll down to Product data, and click on the bol.com tab. The error will be displayed right there and you can consult our bol.com error list on how to solve this.
Update a product
In case you changed some settings in the plugin, for example, the product price margin, you need to update this to bol.com. To do this, please follow these steps:
- Go to your WordPress backend
- Click on the Products tab on the left navigation bar
- Select the product you like to update to bol.com
- Go to Bulk actions and click on Bol: Publish/update
- Lastly, click on Apply
Pause/unpause a product
If you like to pause or unpause a product in bol.com, you can do that in WooCommerce using the Bulk actions. To do this, please follow these steps:
- Go to your WordPress backend
- Click on the Products tab on the left navigation bar
- Select the product you like to pauze/unpause to bol.com
- Go to Bulk actions and click on Bol: Pause/unpause
- Lastly, click on Apply
Delete a product
If you like to remove a product from your bol.com account and their platform, you can do that in WooCommerce using the Bulk actions. To do this, please follow these steps:
- Go to your WordPress backend
- Click on the Products tab on the left navigation bar
- Select the product you like to delete from bol.com
- Go to Bulk actions and click on Bol: Delete
- Lastly, click on Apply
Other product actions
There are other product actions that can be done via the product editing page. These settings are displayed on the Product edit page -> Product data -> Bol.com tab. You'll only use these settings when you like to overwrite the general plugin settings for a particular product. For example, the price margin or shipping cost.
| Option | Type | Explanation |
| Manage EAN? | Checkbox | Use a different EAN code than the general settings |
| Manage reference? | Checkbox | Use a different internal reference than the general settings |
| Manage condition? | Checkbox | Use a different condition than the general settings |
| Manage fulfillment method? | Checkbox | Use a different Fulfilment method than the general settings |
| Exclude account? | Checkbox | Exclude all (bulk) actions for this account |
| Manage price? | Checkbox | Use a different price than the general settings |
| Manage shipping cost? | Checkbox | Use a different shipping cost than the general settings |
| Manage delivery time? | Checkbox | Use a different delivery time than the general settings |
Order processing
The plugin can import bol.com orders into your WooCommerce store, where you can process and send them to the customer. First, let's go through some of the order settings in the plugin. To reach these settings, go to Bol > Synchronization > Orders.
Order settings
| Option | Type | Explanation |
| Import orders | Enable/disable | Enable this if you like to automatically import orders from Bol into your shop |
| Include FBB orders | Enable/disable | Enable this if you want to include FBB orders in the order import. NOTE: This works only when "Import orders" is enabled |
| Disable processing order email | Enable/disable | Enable this if you want to disable the email that is received by the customer when the imported order has status processing |
| Disable completed order email | Enable/disable | Enable this if you want to disable the email that is received by the customer when the imported order has status completed |
| Use my shipping carrier | Enable/disable | Enable this if you want to use your own shipping carrier |
| Shipping carrier | Dropdown | Choose which shipping carrier to use as default. NOTE: This works only when "Use my shipping carrier" is enabled |
| Tracking code source | Input field | Define the order meta key where the tracking code is added by your 3rd-party shipping plugin. NOTE: This works only when "Use my shipping carrier" is enabled |
| Address format | Dropdown | Choose which address format to use for the imported orders |
Process a bol.com order in WooCommerce
The plugin imports orders from bol.com into WooCommerce, once every hour. You can find the order(s) on the WooCommerce > Orders page. On the order page, the Bol filter will indicate if it's a Bol order or not.
To actually process the order, please follow these steps:
- Go to WooCommerce > Orders
- Click on the desired bol.com order
- In the order edit page, click on the button Process Order
- Select the items (products) that should be processed
- After that, click on Check delivery options
- Choose a carrier (or use your own carrier)
- Lastly, click on Register shipment
The order status first goes into Processing, then after a few minutes, it'll go to Registered.
Cancel a bol.com order in WooCommerce
You can also cancel a bol.com order in WooCommerce, via our plugin. The steps are identical to processing an order:
- Go to WooCommerce > Orders
- Click on the desired bol.com order
- In the order edit page, click on the button Process Order
- Select the items (products) that should be canceled
- Then select a cancellation reason by using the dropdown menu
- Lastly, click on Cancel selected items
The order status first goes into Processing, then after a few minutes, it'll go to Canceled.
Tools
The bol.com plugin offers a few tools that can solve an issue, or smoothen things up. Let's go through all of them.
Heartbeat
We implemented this option in all of our plugins because we noticed a problem in a lot of shops. By default, our plugins (in this case bol.com) will create a scheduled action called bol_perform, which runs every minute to trigger the processing of plugin tasks. This action relies on WordPress's default cron system, meaning it only runs when someone visits your website.
If your website experiences a period of inactivity, the scheduled action won't run until the next visit. As a result, the plugin may not execute tasks at the intended intervals, potentially causing delays.
A solution to this problem is to create a cron job. By enabling the Heartbeat option, it'll create a cron job on our server to ping your shop every minute. Basically simulating a visitor, so that the plugin tasks will keep running.
Tools
This page has a few options in case things go wrong.
Woosa IP list
In case you have some heavy security measures on your server, please whitelist our IP addresses listed here.
Clear cache
In case you think the synchronization is stuck, for example, importing orders, you can clear the plugin cache to reset some background processes.
Action List
This page will tell you exactly what the plugin is doing. You can see the number of actions that are being active or rescheduled.
Logs
All (error) logs related to our plugins. In this way, a support agent or developer can debug when an error occurs.