The following are the most frequently asked questions about the Advanced Billing feature of ServiceCEO®.
1. What does the Group charges for this setup together in the Billing Center? check box do?
A: It creates a new group or invoice line for all of the charges controlled by the Billing Setup in the Create Invoices tab of the Billing Center.
A: How this check box works for each level of your company hierarchy (except for Region An organization level between Organization (the highest level) and Branch. Regional users will be able to see data regarding all branches and zones within their region.) is explained below:
Company. Every job for the entire company will be included in its own group.
Branch. Every job in the branch will be included in its own group.
Customer. All of the customers jobs will be included in its own group.
Schedule. All of the schedules jobs will be included in its own group.
Project. All of the projects visits will be included in one group.
Job/Project visit. All of the charges for the job or project visit will be included in its own group.
Charge. All of the allocation lines for the charge will be included in one group.
When using this check box, be aware that each group can create only one invoice. In other words, you will not be able to combine charges from different groups together onto one invoice.
3. Why cant I select Dollar from the Type drop-down list?
A: Dollar is only available from the Type drop-down list at the charge level. This decision was made due to confusion regarding where allocation splits are applied. Since all allocation line definitions are inherited down to the charge level, dollar splits defined at the higher levels don't make sense. For example, if you defined an allocation line for $50.00 at the customer level, thinking the first $50.00 of every job would appear on its own invoice, this setup would instead split the first $50.00 of every charge as its own line in the Create Invoices tab of the Billing Center.
4. Why does no value appear in the Estimated $ column of the Billing Setup dialog box?
A: The estimated amount only appears in the Billing Setup dialog box at the Job or Charge levels of the company hierarchy.
5. Do I have to choose a relative date in the Make Charges Invoiceable field?
A: No. You can leave the default value of 0 days After Start Date in the Make Charges Invoiceable field. All charges will appear in the Create Invoices tab of the Billing Center on the day in which the work is performed. In other words, 0 days After Start Date equals date the job is performed.
6. Does the Make Charges Invoiceable field have to be relative? Can I use an exact date?
A: You can select an exact date on the Job and Charge level. Select Select Date from the Date drop-down list and select the date you want to use from the Calendar box.
7. What if I don't want to split any charges? How do I configure my billing setup?
A: If you want to put an entire charge - not a split or fraction of that charge - on an invoice, do not add any allocation lines to the Billing Setup dialog box. The one allocation line the Remaining Balance line will not create multiple lines for the charge in the Create Invoices tab of the Billing Center.
8. What is the difference between the two allocation notes fields in the Billing Setup dialog box?
A:
Allocation Notes. Notes entered in this field (you can add one for each allocation line) appear as read-only notes at the charge level of the Create Invoices tab of the Billing Center. They are used to help distinguish the different charges from each other. We recommend typing a brief overview of the allocation line in the Allocation Notes field.
Billing Setup Notes. Internal notes that only appear in the Billing Setup dialog box. Normally used for informational purposes. Inherited along with the Billing Setup based upon the company hierarchy.
A: Have you enabled the customer as a Third Party Bill Payer A Third Party Bill Payer is a customer who will be paying the bills for other customers. Thus, you can configure (through Advanced Billing) that all or a portion of a job's products/services will not be paid by the customer for whom the work is being performed but instead to the third party bill payer. An example of a third party bill payer is a franchise company that pays 30% of all marketing costs for all of its franchisees.? You can do so by opening the Detail tab of the customer that you want to use as a Third Party Bill Payer and selecting the Third party bill payer check box.
A: The Third Party Bill Payer and Service Contract A contract for service that enables you to separate the sale of goods
or services from the act of providing those goods or services.
columns never appear at the Company or Branch level Billing Setup dialog
boxes.
In addition, you need to enable Service Contracts before you will see the
Service Contract column. See the Service
Contracts Options topic for details.
1. Can you explain the difference between a pre-bill and post-bill Billing Cycle?
A: The Pre-bill charges and Post-bill charges option buttons control whether charges before or after the Billing Cycle's frequency appear on the frequency date in the Create Invoices tab of the Billing Center. For example, if you've defined your Billing Cycle frequency as occurring every Monday, and you open the Create Invoice tab of the Billing Center on Monday, November 14th, 2005:
Pre-bill charges. You will see all charges from 11/14/05 through 11/21/05.
Post-bill charges. You will see all charges from 11/7/05 through 11/13/05.
A: The most likely reason is that you've also defined a Make Charges Invoiceable value in your Billing Setup. The Billing Cycle works together with the Make Charges Invoiceable values (e.g., three days before start date); thus, if the Make Charges Invoiceable value for the charge would not fall within the Billing Cycle's frequency, then the charge will not appear in the Billing Center until the next frequency rolls around.
Another reason why the billing cycle may not be honored is if you are using Third Party Bill Payers A Third Party Bill Payer is a customer who will be paying the bills for other customers. Thus, you can configure (through Advanced Billing) that all or a portion of a job's products/services will not be paid by the customer for whom the work is being performed but instead to the third party bill payer. An example of a third party bill payer is a franchise company that pays 30% of all marketing costs for all of its franchisees. (TPBPs). If you create a job with only ONE allocation line that is using a TPBP, the billing cycle for that job is ignored in favor of the TPBP's billing setup and billing cycle. However, if more then one allocation line exists, the allocation lines without the TPBP will use the job's billing cycle.
3. What is the Billing Cycle Start Date?
A: The date on which the billing cycle will start, as defined in the Start On calendar box of the Billing Frequency dialog box. All charges that have a Make Charges Invoiceable date that occurs before the Billing Cycle's Start On date will not be controlled by the Billing Cycle.
4. What is the Billing Cycle End Date?
A: You can define when you want a Billing Cycle to end by selecting the No end date, End after X occurrences, or End on [specific date] option button in the Continue For section of the Billing Frequency dialog box. After the defined date, the Billing Cycle ends, meaning that charges that were being controlled by the Billing Cycle now appear in the Create Invoices tab of the Billing Center based on their Make Charges Invoiceable value.
1. How can I create one invoice that contains invoices for multiple jobs?
A: Follow these steps:
At the appropriate level of your company hierarchy, click Billing Setup to display the Billing Setup dialog box.
Deselect the Inherit Billing Setup from check box.
Select Advanced from the Billing Mode drop-down list.
Define the allocation lines for this billing setup as necessary.
Do NOT select the Group charges for this setup together in the Billing Center? check box.
Click OK.
Open the Create Invoices tab of the Billing Center and expand the list to display the customer for whom you want to create an invoice.
Select the check box corresponding to every charge you want to add to the invoice. Since all charges are included in the same group, every charge that you select will be included on the same invoice.
Edit the values that will be inserted on the invoice as necessary by editing the values at the Group level (the level displayed in red).
Click Create Invoices. The invoice is created. You can view the invoice on the Unsent Invoices tab or the customer's Billing History tab.
2. How can I create one invoice for an individual charge?
A: Follow these steps:
At the appropriate level of your company hierarchy, click Billing Setup to display the Billing Setup dialog box.
Deselect the Inherit Billing Setup from check box.
Select Advanced from the Billing Mode drop-down list.
Define the allocation lines for this billing setup as necessary.
Select the Group charges for this setup together in the Billing Center? check box.
Click OK.
Open the Create Invoices tab of the Billing Center and expand the list to display the customer for whom you want to create an invoice.
Open the group that contains the charge you want to put onto an invoice.
Select the check box corresponding to the charge (or fraction of a charge) that you want to add to the invoice.
Edit the values that will be inserted on the invoice as necessary by editing the values at the Group level (the level displayed in red).
Click Create Invoices. The invoice is created. You can view the invoice on the Unsent Invoices tab or the customer's Billing History tab.
3. How can I combine charges from multiple customers together on one invoice?
A: The only way to do this is to use a Third Party Bill Payer A Third Party Bill Payer is a customer who will be paying the bills for other customers. Thus, you can configure (through Advanced Billing) that all or a portion of a job's products/services will not be paid by the customer for whom the work is being performed but instead to the third party bill payer. An example of a third party bill payer is a franchise company that pays 30% of all marketing costs for all of its franchisees.. There is no way to combine charges for multiple customers onto one invoice in the Billing Center .
4. How can I create a separate invoice for each job using a Third Party Bill Payer?
A: Follow these steps:
Open the Third Party Bill Payer's A Third Party Bill Payer is a customer who will be paying the bills for other customers. Thus, you can configure (through Advanced Billing) that all or a portion of a job's products/services will not be paid by the customer for whom the work is being performed but instead to the third party bill payer. An example of a third party bill payer is a franchise company that pays 30% of all marketing costs for all of its franchisees. customer record.
Click Billing Setup. The Billing Setup dialog box appears.
Select the Group charges for this setup together in the Billing Center? check box.
Click OK.
Open the Create Invoices tab of the Billing Center and expand the list to display the Third Party Bill Payer.
Open the group that contains the job for which you want to create an invoice.
Edit the values that will be inserted on the invoice as necessary by editing the values at the Group level (the level displayed in red).
Click Create Invoices. The invoice is created. You can view the invoice on the Unsent Invoices tab or the customer's Billing History tab.
1. What does the Pre-Bill filter on the Create Invoices tab of the Billing Center filter for?
A: Selecting and running the Pre-Bill Only filter on the Create Invoices tab of the Billing Center will display only those charges being controlled by an Advanced Billing setup using a Billing Cycle that has the Pre-Bill Charges option button selected (located in the Scheduled Charge Handling section).
A: Several things could be occurring here, including:
Date Range. Use the Billable in Range filter to adjust your date range to include the date you defined in the Billing Setup dialog box.
Billing Cycle. If you defined a Billing Cycle, this may be limiting when the charges appear on the Create Invoices tab of the Billing Center.
Third Party Bill Payer. If you defined a Third Party Bill Payer A Third Party Bill Payer is a customer who will be paying the bills for other customers. Thus, you can configure (through Advanced Billing) that all or a portion of a job's products/services will not be paid by the customer for whom the work is being performed but instead to the third party bill payer. An example of a third party bill payer is a franchise company that pays 30% of all marketing costs for all of its franchisees. in the Billing Setup, you may be looking under the incorrect customer. All charges that are being paid by a Third Party Bill Payer will appear under the Third Party Bill Payers name on the Create Invoices tab of the Billing Center.
After Completion Date. If you selected After Completion Date as the value from the Make Charges Invoiceable section in the Billing Setup dialog box, you will not be able to see this charge until after its job is completed. In addition, ServiceCEO will not know the date on which to display the charge until the job is completed, so using the Billable in Range filter to expand the date range will not work either.
A: The most likely answer is that you selected a Third Party Bill Payer A Third Party Bill Payer is a customer who will be paying the bills for other customers. Thus, you can configure (through Advanced Billing) that all or a portion of a job's products/services will not be paid by the customer for whom the work is being performed but instead to the third party bill payer. An example of a third party bill payer is a franchise company that pays 30% of all marketing costs for all of its franchisees. (TPBP) in the customer or jobs Billing Setup. The customer that appeared is the TPBP. If you look closely, you should see that the charges for the job you just completed appear under this customer. Note also that if a TPBP is paying all or a portion of a job being completed, this fact will be displayed in the Information section of the Completion Wizard.
A: The solutions for this question are the same as in question #2.
5. What are the different rows in the Create Invoices tab?
A: There are four levels in the Create Invoices tab of the Billing Center:
Master Level. Also known as the All Payees level, this level displays the amount of all charges currently being displayed. Typically only used to select/deselect all of the check boxes beneath it.
Customer Level. Displayed in blue, this level summarizes the values for all of the customer's charges. The date value on this level is the date of the customer's oldest charge.
Invoice/Group Level. Displayed in red, this level displays the values that will be put on the invoice when the invoice is created. The date value on this level defaults to today's date. You can edit any values that are located in a column whose header is bolded (i.e., the Date, Sent? and Notes values).
Charge Level. Displayed in black, this level summarizes each specific charge. The date value on this level corresponds to the date on which the charge should be put on an invoice, as defined in the Billing Setup dialog box (by either the Make Charges Invoiceable values, a Billing Cycle, or both).
6. How can I determine the charge's job on the Create Invoices tab?
A: You can determine what job the charge was originally part of by expanding the list and, at the charge level, and reading the job number from the Job column.
7. How can I edit the date of the invoice that I am creating?
A: You can edit the date of an invoice on all tabs of the Billing Center:
Create Invoices. Click into the Date field at the Group level (the level displayed in red) and type a new invoice date. When you click Create Invoices, the invoice will be created with this new date.
The Unsent Invoices, Unpaid Invoices, and Find by Number. Click into the Date field for the invoice you want to edit. Type a new invoice date, click out of the invoice field, and click Save Invoices.
8. What other invoice values can I edit in the Billing Center?
A: Other then the invoice date, you can edit several other invoice values:
Sent? Select the Ready to Send value you want to assign to the invoice from the drop-down list. For more on the Ready to Send workflow, see the Ready to Send Workflow topic.
Notes. Type or edit any of the notes you want to display on the invoice.
Locked? Available on the Unsent Invoices and Unpaid Invoices tabs, you can control if the invoice is locked or not. None of the values on a locked invoice can be edited.
A: If a payment equal to or above the amount of the invoice is already applied to it, once the invoice is sent, the invoice will not appear in the Unpaid Invoices tab of the Billing Center (since it has already been paid). You will be able to view the invoice on the customers Billing History tab.
If a payment was not applied to the invoice, the filter settings on the Unpaid Invoices tab may be set so that the invoice you expect to see will not appear.
A: The most likely reason an invoice appears in the Billing Center with a $0.00 balance is that you created an invoice for only charges that are covered by a service contract A contract for service that enables you to separate the sale of goods or services from the act of providing those goods or services..
A: Yes, the two dates are different. On the Create Invoices tab, the charge level dates indicate the date on which the charge appeared in the Billing Center (based upon the charge's Billing Setup) so you can determine what charges should be included on what invoices. On the Unsent Invoices and Unpaid Invoices tab, the charge level date will display the date on which the charge's job was actually performed.
1. Can I edit an invoice after it is created?
A: Unfortunately, you cannot edit an invoice after it is created via Advanced Billing. However, you can append an invoice by attaching an adjustment to the invoice. See the Transaction Overview section for more on creating an adjustment.
A: No, the invoice and payment is always stored in the Billing History tab of the customer that was billed and paid. A workaround may be to add a link to the customer's Third Party Bill Payer A Third Party Bill Payer is a customer who will be paying the bills for other customers. Thus, you can configure (through Advanced Billing) that all or a portion of a job's products/services will not be paid by the customer for whom the work is being performed but instead to the third party bill payer. An example of a third party bill payer is a franchise company that pays 30% of all marketing costs for all of its franchisees. in the customer's Links tab so that you can quickly open the Third Party Bill Payer's record. See the Customers Links Tab section for details.
3. What other Advanced Billing training materials are available to me?
A: If you need additional help, use these materials:
Prerecorded
Training Classes. There are several training classes devoted
to Advanced Billing in the Insight Direct Member Center.
To learn how to access the member center, please read the Accessing Insight Direct's Member Center document.
Once in the member center, click the Watch Pre-Recorded Training
Videos link.
Discussion Boards. You can join a community of Advanced Billing users by participating in the Billing and Invoicing discussion board forum. You can access this discussion board in two ways:
Through the member center. Login to the Member Center and click the Discussion Boards link. A new browser will appear. Login using your username and password. Once logged into the member center, click the Billing and Invoicing folder in the Functionality - ServiceCEO section.
Directly. Click this link: http://ws3.insightdirect.com/IDBB/forum.asp?FORUM_ID=12
If you would like to contribute to a discussion about this document, please use the Advanced Billing FAQ topic, located at http://ws3.insightdirect.com/IDBB/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=244.
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