Table of Contents
What are Rated Billing Items?
Rated Billing Items is the information generated by the Billing Engine which represents a set of Services and Physical Goods that were provided to customers accompanied by their applicable rates and how those were calculated. Rated Billing Items provide information on the Product to be billed, the billing period (in case of continuous Service), the rate of charge, applicable discounts, and anything else that might affect the final price of a product.
Rated Billing Items are created by the Rating process, either during Billing or by user intervention.
Rated Billing Items Glossary
| Term | Description |
|---|---|
| Billable Entities | A set of entities which can be billed through the Billing Engine. i.e. Jobs and Subscriptions. |
| Rated Billing Items | The entity created by the initial step of the Billing Run - Identification & Rating - which holds information related to the billing of a Product. |
| Usage Service Catalogs | Catalogs used to maintain all Usage Service information including rates and the conditions for those services to become available. |
| Price Plans | Price Plans are a set of rates which define the amount an Accounts Receivable should be billed based on the Services or Physical Goods that were provided. |
| Normal Billing | Normal Billing is used to bill customers before or after they start using Services they have bought or are subscribed to. Normal Billing is handled by the execution of Normal Billing Runs. The entity created by Normal Billing Runs is Financial Transactions which are used to debit or credit the customer's Accounts Receivable. |
| Prepaid Billing | Prepaid Billing is a business billing model where customers pay in advance for Services they want to buy or subscribe to, and the billing is handled by the execution of a Prepaid Billing Run. The financial entity created by Prepaid Billing Runs is Wallet Transactions which are used to debit or credit the customer's Wallet. |
| UDRs | Subscription Usage Detail Records (UDRs) are used to hold raw information describing Usage Services. For more information view Usage Detail Records. |
Rated Billing Items Key Processes and Concepts
| Processes / Concept | Description |
|---|---|
| Adjusting Rated Billing Items with Errors | Rated Billing Items are created by the Billing Engine before creating Financial Transactions. This gives the user the option to review the Rated Billing Items and make corrections before billing proceeds to create the transactions. The process available for correcting Rated Billing Items are:
The above processes are also available for already billed Rated Billing Items, such as Items created via the Prepaid Billing Run (which does not offer a staged progression like the Normal Billing Run). View Managing Rated Billing Items for more information. |
| Billing Single Rated Billing Items | Normal Billing Run and Prepaid Billing Run are responsible for billing all unprocessed Rated Billing Items. The manual billing of individual Rated Billing Items is also possible through the respective action, available in the Rated Billing Items Data Entry page. View Managing Rated Billing Items for more information on how to bill Rated Billing Items |
| Classifying Rated Billing Items | Rated Billing Items (RBIs) are classified based on the process that created them so you can easily identify them. RBIs can be classified as follows:
|
Rated Billing Items Access & Viewing Controls
Business Network Characteristics define the level of access for each entry. i.e. Whether it will be available for selection, viewing or editing.
| Entity | Network Characteristics | Description |
|---|---|---|
Rated Billing Items | Rated Billing Items can be accessed, viewed and modified by users that belong to the Group defined at the Owned By Group of the related Subscription or Job, or that belong to a Group that collaborates with the specified Group or by Super Users. |
Rated Billing Items Related Modules
| Entity | Interaction of Rated Billing Items with the Entity |
|---|---|
| Financial Transactions | Invoice and Credit Note lines that make up Invoices and Credit Notes can be the result of Normal Billing Runs processing debit or credit Rated Billing Items |
| Buy in Advance Requests | If a Buy in Advance request exists in the System, then it is related with the Rated Billing Item that was created for the specified period. |
| Additive Discounts | If Ad Hoc or Auto Apply Discounts exist for the billable entity, they are related with the Rated Billing Item for the specified period. |
| Wallet Transactions | Wallet Transaction can be the result of Prepaid Billing Runs processing debit or credit Rated Billing Items. |
| UDRs | UDRs are used by Rated Billing Items to bill Usage Services. |
| Price Plans | Price Plans are used to retrieve the rates with which a Product will be billed. For Usage Service products the rate will be retrieved from a Usage Service Catalog. |
| Usage Service Catalogs | Usage Service Catalogs are used to retrieve the rates with which a Usage Service will be billed. |
| Products | Productsthat are being billed. |
Rated Billing Items - Business Examples
The following section provides business examples of how the CRM.COM Rated Billing Items module is used.
Previewing Rated Billing Items after Billing Run Execution
Business Requirement
Company ZX invoices its Subscribers once a month. Due to the high volume of bills created, the management requires a pre-billing step where Subscriptions to be billed and the amount with which each one is billed should be investigated before the actual bills are issued.
When issues are identified, billing should be either corrected or halted till decision on how to proceed is taken.
CRM.COM Solution
- Configure and execute a Normal Billing Run as described in Managing Normal Billing Runs up to Rating State
- Once the Billing Run is completed the database can be queried by predefined queries that aim to find irregularities
- Identified irregularities can be handled via CRM.COM user interface, Rated Billing Items screen by one of the following actions, available at Managing Rated Billing Items
- Adjust Rated Billing Item
- Cancel Rated Billing Item
- Exclude Rated Billing Item
- Once the changes are executed on the Rated Billing Items, the Normal Billing Run should be progressed accordingly.