Understanding Billing Processes and Master Data in SAP Utilities

In this unit, you will get an initial overview of the billing functions and billing master data.

For implausible meter reading and Billing outsorting, the embedded machine learning scenario must be added:

SAP Utilities can bill commercial and industrial customers, residential customers, and co-generators in the same data structures with the same functions. Differentiation only occurs in the data. The customers are managed as business partners in the system.

You can bill the following divisions using SAP Utilities: electricity, gas, water, waste water, district heating and waste disposal. Flat-rate charges for other divisions such as cable television and multimedia can also be included. In addition, all types of charges and duties can be included.

Examples of charges and duties are the following:

• Cable television
• Local charges
• Dog license fee

The following points apply to billing utility fees:

• Based on a universal billing engine
• Billing of residential and commercial & industrial customer contracts
• Supports the billing procedures of the international utilities industry, for example: periodic billing, interim billing, period- end billing, floating backbilling, final billing, budget billing, average monthly billing
• Can handle new billing procedures
• Convergent billing and intercompany invoicing
• Thermal gas billing, billing of co-generators and flat-rate installations

The following billing procedures are supported:

• Periodic billing is consumption billing carried out on a regular basis.
• Floating backbilling is a form of monthly periodic billing. If necessary, values from previous months in a billing year are recalculated and backbilled using a current value.
• Period-end billing is carried out separately after a billing cycle. Periodic billings can, if necessary, be recalculated and backbilled.
• Interim billing is not controlled by scheduling functions and can be carried out manually at any time (upon customer request, for example).
• Final billing is triggered when a customer moves out.
• In the budget billing plan, an average amount is determined either by simulation or manually. The customer pays this average amount for a period of 12 months. At the end of this period, a new simulation is run for the next period.
• In Average Monthly Billing/Equalized Billing, the customer is charged an average amount based on billings over the next 12 months (or less in the case of new customers).
• Convergent billing enables the system to bill for multiple service types in one system and on one invoice where desired.

In billing the most important business objects are the installation (contains the rate category) and the device, in particular the installation structure (contains the rate type for each register). Additionally, some fields in the following business objects are used in billing: installation, device, installation structure, contract and contract account. These will be described later on during the course.

In invoicing the most important business object is the contract account.

The rate category classifies the installation for billing.

The following are some examples of rate categories:

• Household rate
• Commercial rate
• Commercial rate with demand measurement
• Industrial rate
• Minimal consumption rate
• Basic price rate 1
• Basic price rate 2
• Domestic water
• Reserve water
• Reserve water

The rate type classifies the register for billing. The following are some examples of rate types:

• On-peak rate active energy
• Off-peak rate active energy
• On-peak rate reactive energy
• On-peak rate active power
• Gas consumption
• Water consumption

The rate types are usually known at the beginning of the project and only need to be maintained once.

In this example, two rates are determined (on-peak household rate and off-peak household rate) with both rate types (on-peak rate and off-peak rate) in connection with the rate category (household customers without measured demand).

In this case, the energy price for the single-rate meter is identical to that of the on-peak rate meter, so the same rate can be used for both single and on-peak rates; in other words, you can use just one rate type for both single and on-peak rate. If the prices were different, then an additional rate type (single rate) and an additional rate (single household rate) would be necessary.

The rate bills the consumption from the register. It is determined in a Customizing table using the combination of rate category and rate type.

Variant programs are contained in rates as rate steps. Variant programs are basic calculation steps (for example, consumption x price, determination of the basic price, or determination of the rental price). In this case, the demand price (basic price flat rate) and the rental price are included in the on-peak rate as variant programs.

The prices in the system must be entered as price keys. Each application requires that different price categories are entered (e.g. quantity-based price, time-based price).

All rates that can be billed together in the same contract/installation (for example, on-peak rate for household customers, off-peak rate for household customers) must be brought together in one billing schema.

The schema contains the billing logic and the processing order of the rates and rate steps (variant programs). A schema can contain one or more rates.

The billing process follows a fixed procedure:

• Data collection and analysis

  All data that is needed for billing is collected and prepared for analysis.

• Proration

  If duties, prices, or taxes have changed during a billing period, the values relevant to billing (for example, consumption) must be prorated according to the date of the change.

• Quantity conversion

  The quantities to be billed are determined from the meter reading results. Meter factors, PT/CT ratios, and conversions due to thermal gas billing are taken into account, for example.

• Quantity valuation

  Quantity valuation is the actual contract billing: rates and their variant programs are processed on the basis of the billing schema.

• Validation of billing results

  The billing results are validated after valuation.

• Generation of billing line items