What really determines the price is not AFASDutch ERP package for administration, HR and payroll. Many SMBs have their single source of truth in it. itself, but the number of decisions your process contains. Below are the six factors that make the difference, the costs that shouldn't be in the quote, and the calculation with which you determine whether it's feasible.
Want to process webshop orders from Shopify, WooCommerce or Lightspeed automatically in AFAS? See the AFAS webshop integration service: it explains the possible data flows, checks and implementation considerations. This article explains how pricing is determined.
Specifically looking for an AFAS OCI integration to purchase from suppliers? That is a different flow from sending webshop orders into AFAS. On the AFAS integration page you can see which OCI, InSite and approval questions to answer first. We establish the required scope before quoting a price.
The six factors that determine the price
The number of data flows
One flow is one flow. “Webshop orders to AFAS” sounds like one thing, but often contains four: the customer, the item, the order and the payment. Each flow has its own fields, checks and exceptions.
Rule of thumb: budget € 1.200 to € 2.500 per data flow, with discounts when flows are similar.
One direction or two
Writing data to AFAS is manageable. Sending data back from AFAS to a system that also changes it is an order of magnitude more difficult — because you have to decide which system is authoritative for each field. Which one wins if the price has been changed in the online store and in AFAS too?
That choice isn’t technical; it’s a business decision. If it’s missing, you automate confusion. Two-way integrations make a connection roughly 60 to 100 percent more expensive.
The number of exceptions
This is the biggest hidden cost. The standard order is built like this. But then: a customer with a non-standard payment term, an item that isn’t in AFAS, an order with a project discount, a foreign VAT situation, a return.
In practice, twenty percent of the work is in the standard process and eighty percent is in the exceptions. Any supplier who doesn’t discuss this with you upfront will send you an additional-work invoice later.
The practical test: before requesting a quote, write down ten real orders from last month. Not the straightforward ones — the unusual ones. Every exception you mention upfront costs less than that same exception later.
The quality of your AFAS setup
AFAS is so flexible that every setup is different. Are your customer records unique and clean? Do you use custom fields consistently? Are your items structured?
If the answer is “more or less,” you’ll pay for cleanup before a single line of integration code is written. That isn’t money wasted—an integration built on messy data only spreads the mess faster—but be prepared for it.
The coupling to the other side
AFAS unlocks data via GetConnectors (reading) and UpdateConnectors (writing), with token authentication via an AppConnector. That's predictable work. The unpredictability usually sits in the other system: a webshop with quirks APIAn agreed connection point with which two systems can read and write each other's data, without anyone having to type anything over., a planning tool without documentation, an old package that can only do CSV.
So always ask your supplier: what part of the price is on the AFAS side and what part is on the other side?
Who manages the connection after that
An integration that nobody monitors goes down on a Tuesday and you notice on Friday. Management costs € 25 to € 150 per month, depending on whether you want monitoring only or also someone to fix the outage.
Factor this into your business case from day one. If you don’t, it’ll be an unpleasant surprise a year from now.
What shouldn’t be included in the price
- License costs for an intermediary layer. Some providers build your connection on their own platform and charge for it monthly. That can work fine, but ask what happens if you cancel. Often, your connection stops working.
- Hourly billing with no cap. When an integration has been properly scoped, a supplier can give you a fixed price. If they can’t, the process hasn’t been scoped well enough — it isn’t too complex.
- Ownership of the code. Explicitly ask whether the code and documentation belong to you. If not, you’re buying dependency.
The way it works now
- The appointment is in one colleague's mailbox
- Data is manually retyped from one system to another
- The person who knows is on vacation
- No one can see afterwards why this decision was made
As it is
- The agreement is stored with the client, findable for everyone
- Once entered, information flows through to the rest
- Work continues, even if someone is absent
- Every decision has a source, an owner, and a date
When does it pay for itself?
The calculation is simpler than people think.
Suppose two employees spend six hours a week entering orders together. At an internal rate of € 45 per hour, that costs € 14.040 per year. On top of that, there’s rework: conservatively allow for one error per fifty orders, each costing twenty minutes of investigation and sometimes a credit note.
An integration costing € 6,000 with € 600 per year in management pays for itself in this example in about five months.
If you’re doing less than two hours of manual work a week, the numbers are much less convincing, and the honest advice is often: not just yet.
The cheapest route isn’t always custom work
Standard connectors exist between AFAS and frequently used packages. Costs: often €50 to €250 per month, no build costs. If your process is close to standard and exceptions are rare, then that is by far the most sensible choice.
Custom development makes sense when:
A supplier who only sells custom work will never point you to the connector. So ask about it yourself.
This is how you stay in control of the price
- Start with one painful process. Not "connect everything." Quote → AFAS invoice, or work order → AFAS line item.
- Write down your exceptions before requesting a quote.
- Choose which system is authoritative for each type of data. On paper, before development begins.
- Ask for a fixed price. And what happens if things run over.
- Agree on the handover. Documentation, access, and guidance for your team.
Read more about the options and pitfalls in Connecting AFAS and Exact: how it works in practice. To find out what an integration could deliver in your situation, see Have an AFAS integration built.
Frequently asked questions
Not in practice, and that’s usually not a problem. AFAS doesn’t have classic webhooks; you sync on a schedule, for example every fifteen minutes. That’s enough for almost any SME process, and it’s more reliable than real time.
Two to six weeks from kickoff to go-live. The timeline is more often determined by how quickly you arrange access and make decisions than by the build itself.
No. AFAS remains the administrative core, including all historical data and existing integrations. A connecting layer is added around it.
Make sure that's agreed in advance. At Bedrijfsgeheugen, the code, documentation and access belong to the customer, so you can continue with another provider later.
Integrations built properly on GetConnectors and UpdateConnectors are reasonably update-proof. Monitoring catches anything that still goes wrong.
Want to know if it’s worth it for your business?
In a thirty-minute conversation you know which half of the bandwidth you're in. If a connection doesn't solve your problem, you'll hear that too.
From knowing to doing
This article helps you get oriented. Then view the concrete approach for connecting systems in SMEs.