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Parts Unlimited Catalog - Common issues

  • Parts Unlimited Catalog - Common issues

    If your Parts Unlimited catalog isn't pulling the way you expect, the cause is almost always one of two things: missing access to the price file, or the wrong Books selected in your vendor options. Here's how to tell which one is happening and how to fix it.

    401 Unauthorized when downloading brand catalogs

    What you'll see in the job log: Authentication succeeds, the brand list comes back fine (often 500+ brands found), and then every single brand download fails with:

    RESPONSE ERROR: cannot download zip file for: <BRAND>. Cannot run catalog update. Check if user has access to the catalog.

    The HTTP response from Parts Unlimited is a 401 Unauthorized on the /api/parts/export/... endpoint.

    What it means: Your Parts Unlimited login is valid (that's why authentication succeeded), but your dealer account hasn't been granted access to download the price file. The catalog export endpoint sits behind a separate permission from the regular dealer login. Without it, every brand export comes back 401.

    How to fix it:

    1. Reach out to your Parts Unlimited account rep and ask Dealer Development to grant your account access to the price file.
    2. Mention that you're using Spark Shipping. This usually speeds things up because Dealer Development has handled the request before.
    3. Once they confirm access has been granted, run the catalog from your Parts Unlimited vendor page in Spark Shipping. The 401s should be gone and brand downloads will start succeeding.

    If you've already requested price file access and you're still getting 401s, ask your rep to confirm that the access was applied to the same dealer code you have entered in Spark Shipping under Credentials. Mismatched dealer codes are a common gotcha.

    Products are not shown in the catalog

    This one usually means your Parts Unlimited options aren't pulling from the Book that the missing products are listed in.

    Each Parts Unlimited product is associated with one or more Books (Snowmobile, ATV, Offroad, Streetbike, etc.). On the Parts Unlimited vendor options page, you select which Books and Warehouses to pull from. If a product lives in a Book you haven't selected, it won't appear in your catalog.

    How to confirm whether a product is in a specific Book:

    1. Download the DealerPrice.csv file from Parts Unlimited.
    2. Find the row for the product you're missing.
    3. Look at the column headers ending in "Current Year Page" (for example, Oldbook Current Year Page, Snowmobile Current Year Page).
    4. If the page number is 0, the product is not listed in that Book. If it's a non-zero number, the product is in that Book and you should make sure that Book is selected in your vendor options.

    The fastest fix is usually to enable all Books and all Warehouses in your options unless you have a specific reason not to. You can always narrow down later.

    Still not working?

    If catalog runs are still failing after price file access has been granted and your Books are configured correctly, check the Jobs tab on your Parts Unlimited vendor page. The job log shows the exact request and response from Parts Unlimited, which makes it easier for support to pinpoint where things are breaking down. Send the failing job link to support@sparkshipping.com and we'll take a look.