GENRAL — EDIFACT General Purpose Message (D.18B)

The GENRAL message is EDIFACT’s catch-all message: it serves as a vehicle for any structured communication that does not fit a dedicated message — service announcements, operational notices, contractual information, exceptions. It should remain the exception, not the rule. This page summarises the segment structure as published by UN/CEFACT for directory D.18B.

Purpose

The GENRAL message is EDIFACT’s catch-all message: it serves as a vehicle for any structured communication that does not fit a dedicated message — service announcements, operational notices, contractual information, exceptions. It should remain the exception, not the rule.

This page focuses on the structure published by UN/CEFACT for directory D.18B. The segments listed, their status (M / C), position and repetition factor are extracted from the official file genral_c.htm hosted on service.unece.org.

Segment structure

The GENRAL D.18B message has 27 header entries, 0 detail entries and 0 summary entries (segments and groups combined). Groups are shown in bold and their members are indented by actual nesting depth.

Header

Detail

No segment in this section.

Summary

No segment in this section.

Changes vs D.96A

Top-level differences between D.96A and D.18B for the GENRAL message (segments directly inside header / detail / summary, ignoring nested groups). The comparison is indicative: a given tag may have evolved inside nested groups without showing up in this synthesis.

Max-repeat changes

• COM (header): repeat ×1 in D.96A → ×9 in D.18B.

Structural example

Minimal example of an GENRAL D.18B message with mandatory segments only. The goal is to show the exact version declared in UNH (GENRAL:D:18B:UN) — not to replicate a full business case (see the GENRAL D.96A page for an annotated example).

UNB+UNOC:3+5410000000123:14+5410000000456:14+260514:1430+CTRL018001'
UNH+1+GENRAL:D:18B:UN'
BGM+70+GENRAL-2026-0014+9'
DTM+137:20260514:102'
NAD+MS+5410000000123::9'
NAD+MR+5410000000456::9'
RFF+ON:ORDER789'
FTX+AAI+++Cas particulier hors message dédié — voir contrat partenaire annexe B'
UNT+8+1'
UNZ+1+CTRL018001'

Common errors

• Misaligned UNH tokens — The UNH+...+GENRAL:D:18B:UN token must reflect exactly the directory in use — a mismatch between the UNH release and the release agreed with the partner is rejected by every strict validator.
• Wrong UNT segment count — The value after UNT+ must include UNH and UNT themselves. By far the most common sender-side error, regardless of the directory in use.
• Stale code lists — Between D.96A and D.18B, several code lists received new qualifiers (DTM status, RFF qualifier, NAD codes…). Reusing an older directory’s code tables triggers warnings or even rejections depending on the partner’s strict-conformance mode.

Related messages

Other versions of this message available on ediverse.io: GENRAL D.96A, GENRAL D.01B, GENRAL D.10A, GENRAL D.16B, GENRAL D.21B, GENRAL D.24A, GENRAL D.97A, GENRAL D.99B, GENRAL D.00B, GENRAL D.02B, GENRAL D.05A, GENRAL D.08A, GENRAL D.13B, GENRAL D.20B.

X12 functional equivalent: X12 864.

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