Budget Billing Functions

The parameters needed for budget billing are defined in the portion.

Various budget billing procedures can be used. These meet the different requirements of utility companies in Europe and North America.

When you maintain the portion you enter all permissible combinations of budget billing cycle and number of budget billings.

A permissible combination refers to any pair of numbers for the budget billing cycle and number of budget billings where the product is smaller or equal to the billing period (= period length and period category).

Example:

• Period length: 12 months. Period starts: 08/01/14

  Budget billing cycle 01/No. of budget billing amounts: 11 =>

  1st budget billing amount: 08/30/14 2nd budget billing amount: 09/30/14

  11th budget billing 06/30/15

• Budget billing cycle 01/Number of budget billings 12 =>

  1st budget billing 08/30/14 and so on.

  12th budget billing 07/30/15.

If no combination is entered, no budget billings are collected.

In scheduling, all possible budget billing cycles for this portion are defined. A default budget billing cycle is given in the portion and this is valid for all customers in this portion.

The budget billing cycle can be overridden in the contract (for generating the next budget billing plan) or directly in the budget billing plan itself (with immediate effect).

Forms the basis for defining budget billing plans and manages all the budget billings for a billing period of a contract.

• Determines the size of the budget billing amount and the due dates for the amounts
• Can be created, changed, or adjusted manually or automatically. Example:individual processing in a move-in; automatic creation in invoicing
• Header data (such as start and end of budget billing period, document number)
• Due dates valid for all contracts in the budget billing plan (proposal from scheduling)
• Cumulated budget billing amounts and cumulated open budget billing amounts (total from all contracts of a budget billing plan)
• Budget billing amounts and open budget billing amounts from the active contract

The budget billing plan can be maintained either automatically or manually.

The quantity-based extrapolation is carried out, for example, during billing by extrapolating the demand up to the next planned meter reading date. The budget billing items created in this way are transferred to invoicing in the billing document. Invoicing accepts these amounts and distributes them to the individual budget billing due dates.

The standing budget billing amount is entered in the header data of the budget billing plan. This budget billing amount is always used when a budget billing plan is created. If an amount is not entered, the budget billing is determined using the extrapolation document.

Billing calculates the consumption up until the next scheduled meter reading date. Simulated billing is carried out for the budget billing period. The budget billing items created in this way are transferred to invoicing in the billing document. Invoicing accepts these amounts and distributes them to the individual budget billing due dates.

For this reason, ensure you have generated schedule records for the next billing period before you simulate billing.

The planned budget billing print/due dates for each budget billing cycle are specified in the portion.

Terms of payment from the contract account are referred to to determine the actual budget billing due dates.

Under certain circumstances you should not use the terms of payment to determine the due dates for budget billings. In the Document: Determine Due Date from Payment Conditions event (1330), you can execute a due date determination that differs from the normal bills, and is specifically for budget billing dates.

A joint budget billing plan for two or more contracts is created if these are a required group, that is, if they are always invoiced jointly. A budget billing plan such as this consists of two or more sub- budget billing plans.

A contract that does not have to be invoiced with another contract has a separate budget billing plan.

You can define a budget billing plan to be an advance payment plan (for unreliable customers, for example). S If you do this, an additional due date is inserted into the budget billing plan. The other due dates represent advance payments for the next payment period. The final due date in the budget billing plan is the advance payment for the first payment period in the next billing or budget billing period. It is not cleared when the bill is created for the current billing period.

If a budget billing plan is defined as an advance payment plan then, during invoicing, the new budget billing plan is also created as an advance payment plan.

An advance payment plan can also be deactivated.

The existing budget billing plans in the system can be adjusted either automatically or manually.

Manually adjusting means changing the customer's budget billing amount or due dates.

Automatic adjusting means that a selection of budget billing plans defined by selection parameters can be changed automatically. There are two different methods to choose from:

• Adjusting by percentage (increasing, decreasing)
• Adjusting by extrapolation

Within rate maintenance and the express transaction for budget billing maintenance, you can make adjustments either manually, or using extrapolation. In the express transaction it is also possible to execute an extrapolation with meter reading results or period consumptions that have not yet been saved.

In the case of an interim billing, you can decide when creating the meter reading order whether the budget billing plans are to be adjusted.

A letter can be sent out automatically to inform the customer of the budget billing adjustment.

You can use this report to evaluate open billings (for example, missing/implausible meter reading result) and invoices (for example, outsorted billing) according to certain criteria.

The report shows you a list of all billings and invoicings that are still open.

You can also extend the existing budget billing plan. This means that the system includes new budget billing amount due dates in the budget billing plan.

In the next periodic bills, all due dates from the extended budget billing plan are cleared, and the new budget billing plan starts subsequently.