Billing FAQs

I don't see an invoice? When does an invoice generate?

I realize the contract is incorrect and we invoiced the wrong amount. How do we handle this?

I have customers that want us to upload the invoices to a portal (e.g., Ariba). How do I do this?

How do I change the address on an existing invoice? I changed the address on the billgroup but it is not updating the address on existing invoices?

Whether a subscription is billed before or after the service period is set on the rate, in its subscription timing. Every subscription product on the contract follows the timing of the rate it was sold on.

Two ways to check:

Look at the rate. Open the contract's quote, open the offering, and check the rate's subscription timing. You’ll be able to see a dollar sign with an arrow under it pointing right for in advance or pointing left for arrears.

Look at the billing schedule. On the bill group, compare each invoice date with the service period it covers. If the invoice date is at the start of the period, the contract is billed in advance. If it's at the end, it's billed in arrears.

Can a contract be both? Yes, if it has products on different rates. For example, a platform fee billed in advance and a minimum commitment billed in arrears. Check each rate/product line.

Can it change at renewal?
Yes. If the renewal uses a rate with different timing, the new contract follows the new rate.

Invoice generation is determined by a couple inputs such as the status of the contract, billing group, invoice configuration, period of the contract. That said, we have a simple flow to understand when an invoice should be generated.

1. Is invoicing set to manual in settings? If so, next invoice must be generated manually from the Account Overview page.
2. Else, is the billing group cancelled or invoicing for this billing group set to manual? If so, billing group must be set to Active and the next invoice must be generated manually from the Account Overview page.
3. Else, are there any arrears billing or usage products on the contract? If so, the first invoice will not be automatically generated on contract generation. Invoicing will be sent out nightly as dictated by the billing scheduled. This is done to prevent accidentally invoicing before usage is added to an invoice.
4. Else, the first invoice will be generated immediately on contract generation and subsequent invoicing will be sent out nightly as dictated by the billing scheduled.

Everything is ok! Fixing this is a simple 3-step process.

1. Amend the contract to fix any quantities or pricing.
2. Review the newly generated invoice to check if the amounts are as desired.
3. Credit the remainder of the old invoice.

See the video below for an example where we accidentally charged $20/mo but should have charged $10/mo.

This can be done using custom fields.

1. Go to Settings -> Custom Fields
2. Select "Bill Group" as the object and create a custom field

Updating address on the billgroup currently would affect only the new invoices. For updating address on an existing invoice, go to the invoice and make the change there (see images below).

Canceling a contract through the UI

For standard contract cancellations, you can use the built-in cancellation feature:

1. Navigate to your contract in the UI
2. Click on the contract options dropdown
3. Select "Cancel" from the menu

Deactivating bill groups

If you need to stop a bill group from generating future invoices without canceling the entire contract, you can request bill group deactivation. Contact support with the specific bill group ID and they can deactivate it for you.

Important considerations

• Pending invoices in bill groups set to manual invoice generation will not be generated automatically
• If a contract has been uploaded via CSV and contains pending invoices with dates in the past, even if the Bill Group is set to automatically generate invoices, those invoices will not be generated. The system assumes those invoices have already been sent to the customer via an external system.
• If a contract has been cancelled, the bill group will automatically stop generating invoices once the contract end date has passed