Lesson Overview
At the conclusion of this lesson, you will be able to understand the basic concept of billing in contract accounts receivable and payable.
Business Example
There are two different groups of billable items, from a business perspective, in two different divisions. These are Print Services and Internet Sales. These two groups require different billing frequencies, selected based on different criteria, grouped into billing units, and processed into separate billing documents. You achieve this by assigning each group to its own separate billing subprocess.
Then you can process both billing subprocesses together in one billing process or in separate billing processes.
Billing in Contract Accounts Receivable and Payable
Defining the billing process and billing subprocess
To execute billing, you must have defined at least one billing process with an assigned subprocess. A subprocess is a self-contained processing operation within a billing process. It is used to select and group billable items and form a billing document.
If possible the rating system determines the subprocess. Otherwise the subprocess needs to be derived out of rating fields in SAP Convergent Invoicing with loading into the BIT Class.
In case of test data billable items are assigned to a subprocess, if they are created.
The system cannot process them together with billable items of another subprocess in a common billing document.
A subprocess in billing controls the selection of the billing worklist, the grouping of billable items into billing units, and the specification of the billing type.
Therefore, the focus of the billing process lesson is to analyze the billing subprocess.
The billing subprocess steps are listed below:
- Data selection
During data selection, the system selects the billable items for the billing process.
You define the selection criteria for the data selection in selection variants for the billing process.
- Grouping into billing units
The system groups the selected billable items together into billing units for each contract account. Multiple billing units can be created for each contract account.
Billing in contract accounts receivable and payable creates one billing document for each billing unit.
You define the criteria that are used to create the billing units in grouping variants for the billing process.
- Aggregation of billable items
The system includes the selected billable items of a billing unit in the billing document. More so, the billable items are summarized in billing document items. The individual items that belong to this summarization are linked with the billing document item.
- Update
The system writes the billing document created for the billing unit and the individual billed items to the database, and at the same time deletes the processed billable items.
Business Example
In the company Print Service Corporation, data load & telecommunication services should be billed together with the same frequency.
Billable item types DATA1 and TEL1 are used for monthly charges and are summarized into one billing document. Billable item types DAT2 and TEL2 are used for usage charges, and are summarized in another billing document.
The subprocess in the example is called BSDA Billing Subprocess Printing.
The billing subprocess, together with the billable item type, specifies the business significance of an individual billable item. Each billing subprocess is assigned to one or more activated billable item classes at client level.
You can create new subprocesses in customizing for contract accounts receivable and payable under Financial Accounting → Contract Accounts Receivable and Payable → Convergent Invoicing → Basic Functions → Billable Items → Billable Item Management → Define Subprocesses of Billing.
