Overview

Price plans are your company's price catalogues. All the billed products are added to at least one price plan in order for billing to be applicable. Subscribers and customers are billed for their purchases based on the rates defined in the price plan usually agreed upon contract signing.

Major features

• Use price plans to define rates for every billable product that is added to a subscription, job or activity with the exception of usage services which are added in dedicated Usage Price Catalogs. 
• Provide discounts to customers by defining lower than base rates for a specific period, or for a certain purchased quantity
• Create conditional price plans, where rates specified can be applied only on fulfilling conditions specified on each price plan, making them a powerful tool used for providing several types of promotions and discounts to customers.
• Easily manage overall price adjustments due to changed tax rates

Setting Up Price Plans

Price plan rate models

Before setting up your price plans, it is important to understand the different rate models that exist and how billing handles each rate model. When adding new products to the price plan, the rate models available for selection depend on the classification of the product which can be one of the following: expense, termed service, one time service or physical good.

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Price plan fields

This table contains an explanation of the sections of price plans Data Entry page, a description of the usage of its fields and additional information.

 Mandatory   Configurable

Related configuration areas

The following modules are related to price plans and must be configured in order to be able to start using them

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Using Price Plans

Multiple effective price plans can be created and the applicable one (according to the customer's agreement terms) can be selected when creating a subscription or a job. If conditional price plans are available then they are also available for selection given that the selection conditions defined on the price plan are met, but will only e used during billing if the 'validity conditions set on the price plan are met.

Selecting and creating a price plan

Specify the criteria that match the price plan you are interested in or use NEW from the Actions Menu to create a new plan. Provide the mandatory information in the price plan fields table before you SAVE the plan.

Amend existing price plan rates

Price plans already assigned on a subscription or a job cannot be modified, as rates are agreed between the customer and the business when creating the subscription or job. There are occasions however that even price plans that are already added to customers must be amended. For example, a change in VAT or the overall increase of rates regardless of the contract. 
Customers who that have the price plan updated on their job or subscription will be billed with the new price plan rates. Although this is the default behaviour of the system, the user has the option to define (via Billing Definitions) that until the 'binding end date', customers should be charged the previous price plan rates.

1. Search for the price plan you wish to amend and from the Data Entry page click on Actions > Replace from the Actions Menu to open the Replace Price Plan Form modal.
   1. New Price Plan's Effective Date: Define the date from which the new price plan rates will take effect.
   2. Adjust Rates by '%': Add a % to update all rates in the price plan or leave empty to make manual updates.
      If you would like to increase rates then add a positive number, if you would like to decrease all rates then add a negative number. If you want to manually change rates of each product then leave this field blank.
2. Click on SAVE to close the modal.
   If the Adjust Rates By % is defined then, all rates will be automatically updated.  
3. Click on EDIT from the Actions Menu to start updating the price plan rates.

Automatically calculate and apply discount to rates

You have the option to offer a discount on already defined base or tiered rates provided that the price plan is not already in use. By using the Calculate Amount link, you can define a discount as an amount or percentage (%) and the system will calculate and set the new discounted price. The action is available on adding new product rates or editing existing.

1. Select the product rate you want to update.
2. Click on Calculate Amount link, either on the base or tiered rate.
3. In the modal
   
   1. Provide a number in the 'initial amount' text box (this can be the same or different than the base/tiered amount).
   2. Select between amount and percentage and provide a number in the text box below.
   3. Click anywhere outside the text box and check the calculated rate.
   4. Click on SAVE  to apply the change.
      • The system will set the amount that has been calculated, regardless if the 'initial amount' provided was different to the base or tiered amount.

Adding a new product rate to existing price plans

While you cannot change price plans that are already in use you can use Add New Product action to define rates for new products to existing price plans. An alternative to this, is to add the product to an existing price plan when creating the new product directly from the Products data entry page.

1. Click on the name of the plan you would like to add a new product rate to go to the Data Entry page.
2. Click on Actions > Add New Product from the Actions Menu.
3. Use Quick Search or click on the magnifying glass to search for the product .
4. In the modal provide all the necessary information for the creation of the Product as explained in the fields table.
   
   

Creating a conditional price plan

 Conditional price plans as implied by the name can be added and used for billing jobs or subscriptions only if two types of conditions are met. These conditions are defined in the price plan.

• Selection Conditions: If satisfied, the price plan will be available where a price plan is selected to be added to a job or subscription.
• Validity Conditions: If satisfied, the rates from the applied price plan will be used when billing the job or subscription. Validity conditions are required because from the time that a (job or subscription) price plan is set until the time that is it is billed, the 'selection conditions' may no longer be satisfied. It is recommended to have the same conditions defined for selection and validity.
  If during billing, the validity conditions are not met, then the system will get the rates from the base price plan that was used when creating the conditional price plan.

1. Click on NEW from the actions menu to create a new price plan.
   1. Provide the information in the section as in the case of a base price plan and make sure you select a Base Price Plan that the system will use in case the selected conditional price plan conditions are not met during Billing
   2. Rates

      1. All the rates available in the selected Base Price Plan will be present here. Change the rates accordingly or use the Replace Price Plan action to change all the rates simultaneously by a certain percentage.

   3. SELECTION & VALIDITY CONDITIONS

      1. The process for adding Selection or Validity conditions is the same. 
         Follow the steps below:

      2. In 'Evaluation Settings' there are 2 options that can be set at 2 different levels to select whether all conditions or at least one condition should be met.

         1. General: Select whether conditions for all the condition groups should be met or at least one.

         2. Condition Group Specific: Select whether conditions for all rows within each of the condition group should be met or at least one.
            

      3. Once the Evaluation Settings are in place, click on each of the condition groups in the group list on the left to start defining the group row conditions.

         1. Click on ADD to add a new row.
            or 
            ADD FROM TEMPLATE to select an existing condition group row.
            Templates are condition group rows that have been previously saved to be reused. They already contain information such as type, operator and value.

         2. Type: Select the type of the condition from the drop-down list.
         3. Operator: Select whether the values defined should be:
            
            1. 1. Equal
               2. Not Equal
            2. Value: Click on the ADD VALUES link to open the modal to add values for each condition group row, i.e. for the type you have selected.
               1. Like in Evaluation Settings, set whether all the values defined in the modal should be met, or at least one.
                  

               2. Value 1 - Value 20: Use Quick Search or click on the magnifying glass for a search modal to select the values to be set as conditions.

         4. Save as Template: Save the values per Condition Group as a template so that it can be reused in other condition groups of the same type.
            
            1. Click on the SAVE AS TEMPLATE link and provide a name and description.
            2. Once all the Condition Group rows are complete, repeat the process for a new Condition Group.
         5. 1. Allowed Organisational Units
               1. Add the organisational units that can select and assign the Price Plan
                  

         6. Click on SAVE to save the Price Plan

Defining product bundle pricing

A product bundle is a product which is made up of multiple component products; for example an offering to a customer where a single package includes multiple channels. 

There are two types of product bundles, fixed and flexible.

• Flexible Bundle Products: Products that have a variable selection of constituent products as components.
• Fixed Bundle Products: Products that have a fixed selection of constituent products as components.

The price of fixed bundle products can be set just like the rest of the products.  Flexible bundle products which is only applied to termed service, allow the user to:

• Define a price at bundle level; one price for all included products.
• Define a price at the product level and differentiate when a product is sold as a stand-alone product or as part of a bundle.
• Define both prices and bill for both the bundle and each product individually.

Add a rate at the bundle product Level

Add the product and in the 'Rates' section provide all the required information and leave empty 'Applicable Only If Part of Bundle'

Add a rate for a product when provided through a bundle

Add the product and in the 'Rates' section provide all the required information and for 'Applicable Only If Part of Bundle'  select the bundle in which the product belongs, and for which you are defining the rate.

Add a rate for a product that belongs to a bundle but is also sold as a standalone product.

1. Add the product and in the 'Rates' section provide all the required information and leave empty 'Applicable Only If Part of Bundle'
2. Add the product again and in the 'Rates' section provide all the required information and for 'Applicable Only If Part of Bundle'  select the bundle in which the product belongs, and for which you are defining the rate.

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Applying business flows on price plans

Bulk adjustment of rates based on tax changes

Tax changes don't need to be a big hassle. Price Plan Adjustment Run Definitions allow you to define rules that will be used to adjust all affected price plan rates whenever vat or tax rates changes. 

Once the definition is created and scheduling setting set, SUBMIT the definition. Once the run is completed, it will create a new version of each affected price plan and calculate the new rate for products whose tax rate has changed. Note that the adjustment runs should not be used in case the rates in the price plans are not tax inclusive. Refer to Tax Definition, for more information.

Price plan adjustment run definition fields

This table provides an explanation of the sections of the definition Data Entry page, a description of the usage of its fields and additional information.

 Mandatory   Configurable

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