Your billing system is made easier with VISP — just take note of these important items:
There are now two types of billing cycles in VISP – Fixed and Flexible. Fixed billing means you schedule invoicing to happen on a specific day of the month for all of your subscribers. Flexible billing allows your customers to be invoiced on their anniversary, or more specifically, when they signed up for service.
Changing The Paid Thru Date
The system allows some adjustment of the Paid Thru Date during the initial migration of accounts into the software. The recommendation is that this only be done in strict compliance with the migration instructions and not at all after the migration is done.
The reason for this is that the subscriber’s billing term is based on the Paid Thru Date. For fixed billing, for example, when invoices are created on the first day of each month, the billing term of that invoice is based on the end of the term of the previous invoice.
Changing the Paid Thru Date changes the end of the term on the current invoice and affects all future invoices. This can cause subscriber statuses to become out of sync, which can cause the system to invoice subscribers that are paid up and not invoice past due subscribers.
Out-of-sync statuses can also cause the reports to display inaccurate data. Because of these potential issues, it is strongly recommended that you do not manually change the Paid Thru Date on a subscriber record without the assistance of the VISP Client Success team. The software is designed to automatically adjust Paid Thru Dates for you. If you feel that a Paid Thru Date on an account is not accurate, please create a ticket request, and we will correct it for you to avoid any further issues with the account.
Note: If a subscriber signs up for a quarterly package and then after the first quarter indicates that they want to switch to monthly billing, simply change the Billing Cycle on the subscriber’s Billing Info tab from Quarterly to Monthly, and the invoice will automatically adjust. Billing cycle changes must be made during the same month that the invoice was created. If the billing cycle is set as Quarterly and it is changed to Monthly the month after the invoice was created, it will cause severe issues with the account because the change will directly affect the end date of the billing term.
When are invoices created?
Invoices are first created when a package is added to a subscriber. For a fixed billing cycle, invoices are thereafter created on a specific day of the month (usually the 1st), prior to the end term of the previous invoice. For a flexible billing cycle, the software can be configured so customer invoices are generated on their anniversary date.
Example (with proration enabled): A package is added on June 15th for a customer with a monthly term. The invoice is created that prorates the remaining days of the month and then covers one term. The end-term of that invoice is July 31st (prorate for June 15th – June 30th and one term covering July 1st – July 31st). The next invoice is created on July 1st for the next term covering August 1st – August 31st.
When are invoices due?
The first invoice is due on the date it is created. All other Invoices are due on a date between the first and the end of the month, prior to the beginning of the next term as configured.
Example: A package is added on June 15th for a customer with a monthly term. And the ISP has set the invoice Due Date as the 25th. The first invoice is due on June 15th (the creation date), and the next invoice (which is for the August 1st – Aug 31st term) is due on July 25th.
How does the prorating work?
For fixed billing, a prorated charge is automatically added to an invoice each time a new package is added to the account. If you do not wish to prorate the customer, you will need to add a custom line item with a negative amount or post a credit in order to reverse the prorated charges. Another option is to have Visp.net completely turn off prorating for you, and you can add a setup fee to your packages.
How can I edit the invoice?
General accounting practices dictate that you don’t edit invoices and we have embraced that with the software to help keep an accurate accounting for stakeholders. Of course, invoices are only one part of the subscribers’ billing record along with payments, credits and (at times) some adjustments. We have addressed changes you need to make by allowing custom line items to be added and removed from an invoice and corrections can be made by removing prorated charges and charges for packages the subscriber isn’t currently subscribed to.
How are payments applied?
When a payment is posted to a subscriber’s account, it is applied as a line item to the subscriber’s statement. The payment can be manually applied to a specific invoice within the statement or affect the total balance due of an account. This affects the subscriber’s record in the following way: if the payment zeros out the subscriber’s statement, then the Paid Thru Date is forwarded to the end term of the subscriber’s most recent invoice. Otherwise, the Paid Thru Date will behave in the following way: if the payment is sufficient to pay all but the most recent invoice, the Paid Thru Date is forwarded to the end term of the previous invoice. If the payment is less than that required to pay the current invoice or the last invoice, no change is made in the Paid Thru Date. Also, with the payment distribution feature, payments can be applied across multiple invoices and can affect the Paid Thru Fate accordingly.
How do late fees work?
When a subscriber is paying past the due date, you can charge an additional Late Fee or Re-billing Fee. Late fees are applied on the same day or on a predetermined number of days after the account turns past due. An account turns past due a day after the invoice due day or on a predetermined number of days after the invoice is generated, if unpaid.