Manage Imports

Tracking your imports in kolum helps you monitor goods entering your supply chain, understand their associated emissions, and prepare accurately for reporting and compliance. This page gives you a clear overview of how imports work in kolum, why they matter, and what you can manage here.

What You Can Do in the Imports Section

In the Imports section of kolum, you can:

• View all your imports in one clean table, including details like Identifier, CN code, supplier, country of origin, import date, quantity with its measurement unit, customs value with its currency, and emissions data.
• Export your imports; the Import Identifier column of the export carries each import's Identifier, so an exported file can be corrected and uploaded again without creating duplicates.
• Add new imports manually for quick updates or small batches.
• Bulk upload imports using a structured spreadsheet for efficient entry of multiple records, and re-upload the same file later to update those imports in place.
• Edit imports when you need to update or correct data.
• Delete imports if you need to remove incorrect or test entries.

Managing imports accurately ensures your data stays aligned with your operational and emissions records, reducing manual tracking across spreadsheets.

How an import is identified and measured

• Identifier. Every import has an Identifier that is unique within your account. It is the key kolum uses to recognise an import across the table, the detail page, the bulk upload, the export, and the Imports API, so an export you adjust and re-upload updates the existing records instead of duplicating them. The field is optional when you enter data: leave it empty on the form or in the upload file and kolum generates one for you in the form kolum-ImportID-1, kolum-ImportID-2, and so on; imports that existed before this change received such an identifier automatically. You can change an Identifier at any time. The Internal Reference Number stays a free-text tracking reference for your own purposes and is not used to match records.
• Quantity and Measurement Unit. The imported amount is recorded as a Quantity together with a Measurement Unit: kg or t for goods, MWh for electricity. A quantity entered in kg is converted and stored in tonnes, so the table always shows the stored value with its real unit rather than assuming tonnes.
• Customs Value and Customs Value Currency. The customs value is shown together with its currency. The currency is not chosen by hand: kolum derives it from the country of the importing company (for example EUR for a German company), and it is displayed read-only next to the value.

Why Managing Imports Matters

Each import record connects your actual trade transactions to your emissions data in kolum:

• Articles are linked with imports in kolum. An article carries the product-level direct and indirect emissions data, and the import records the actual movement of that article into your supply chain.
• This structure means you do not need to request emissions data from your supplier for every shipment if emissions data for the article already exists in your system. Emissions data often remains valid for up to a year or based on the validity your supplier has specified.
• Managing imports effectively helps you:
  • Track trade activity accurately.
  • Align supplier and product-level emissions data for each import.
  • Maintain clear, audit-ready data for reporting and internal monitoring.

Common Questions

Actual Emissions in the imports table

In the imports table, an import shows Actual Emissions as satisfied when an accepted actual emission response exists for its supplier, CN code, company, and country of origin for the Reporting Timeframe that contains the import date, and that response was accepted within the backfilling window, meaning no later than two months after the import date. An accepted response outside the timeframe containing the import date, or accepted after the backfilling window has closed, does not count; the import remains unmarked and falls back to default data.

Where both a definitive (yearly) entry and a forecast (quarterly) entry cover the import date for the same supplier, CN code, and country of origin, the definitive entry alone determines the flag; the forecast entry is ignored. If no definitive entry exists yet, the forecast entry determines the flag under the same backfilling-window rule.

This applies consistently across all views of the imports table, including filtered, paginated, and exported lists.

When you open an import's emission data detail, the values are shown together with their emission data type. For imports whose Reporting Timeframe starts in 2026 or later, the detail shows the Production Route (as letter, name) in place of Production Method; earlier imports keep their Production Method, surfaced behind a view with a legacy/deprecated badge.

In this section

• Add New Imports
• Bulk Upload Imports
• Glossary For Bulk Upload
• Edit An Import
• Delete An Import

What's new

Every import now has its own Identifier: kolum generates one whenever you leave the field empty, you can edit it at any time, and it is the key that lets a re-uploaded file update existing imports instead of duplicating them. Quantities are always shown with their Measurement Unit (kg, t, or MWh for electricity), and the customs value is displayed together with a currency derived from the importing company's country.

In this section