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Automatic Billing and Allocations Settings
Use the automatic billing process for invoicing those customers with Prebooks and Standing Orders that are ready to be delivered. You can set the system to automatically create those invoices once items are confirmed to the Inventory or during the inbound scanning process.
The automatic billing will invoice any boxes from Prebook or Standing Orders that meet the following criteria:
The items to invoice must be linked to a Standing Order or Prebook.
The customer is NOT on credit hold.
The customer is NOT over their credit limit.
The truck date is NOT in the past. You can configure a set number of days that can be used as a backup (e.g.: by using 1 day, the system will still invoice items that were received today but were supposed to ship yesterday).
The inventory type is NOT "M" (Open Market). The customer type is NOT Future Sales.
Manage Settings
To manage automatic billing and allocations settings, do the following instructions:
Go to Setup and select Settings.
Click on Automatic Billing and Allocations from the Order Entry group of settings.
Modify the settings.
Click on Save.
You can read details about every setting below.
Automatic Billing
There are three options for automatic billing:
On Outbound Scan. This feature allows the system to automatically create invoices and print shipping labels for incoming products that are associated with a Prebook or Standing Order. Once the box is received and scanned in the warehouse, the system will automatically create the invoice for these items and will print the shipping label if this option is enabled. Users can see invoices in Order Entry - Order Summary by filtering for pending confirmation invoices.
Upon Manual Confirmation from Staging. Users can see invoices in Order Entry - Order Summary by filtering for pending confirmation invoices.
Enabled on Incoming Scan or After Inventory Confirmation. This option will allow the automatic billing process to be activated either by scanning the incoming product or manual confirmation from the Staging Area.
Releasing Products to the Inventory
There will be cases in which the products from Prebooks or Standing Orders that are being confirmed or scanned as "Received" to the Inventory were already fulfilled. In some cases, the company user can choose how the system should handle these pre-sold items that have already been invoiced. Two options are available:
"be released into the open market inventory": The system will change the product inventory type to open market "M," and the customer assigned to the product line item will be deleted.
"keep the customer in the inventory": The system will keep the customer and original inventory type for those goods that come from prebooks or standing orders that have already been fulfilled.
Separate in Transit and On-Hand Items
When this option is activated, the system will not combine the same order products already received with those still in transit (farm shipped) during the automatic billing and allocation processes. However, users will be able to manually combine orders from the Order Entry screen. This option only applies to products in boxes.
Consolidate Prebooks and SO items with Open Market items on orders created through Allocations or Automatic Billing
By enabling this option, the system will combine items coming from Prebooks and SOs with those from Open Market on orders created through allocations (manual allocations and massive allocations) or automatic billing. If the setting is disabled, the system will separate the Open Market products on the orders from those coming from Prebooks and SOs.
Separate Holiday and Regular Items on Orders Created by Allocation or Automatic Billing
If this option is enabled, the system won't combine products coming from regular and double orders (holiday) during the automatic billing and allocation processes, even if they have the same products. However, users will be able to manually combine orders from the Order Entry screen. Remember that this option only applies to products in boxes.
Separate items by port of origin on orders created through allocations or automatic billing
When this option is enabled, the system will separate in different orders the items shipped from different ports of origin. This option applies for orders created through the allocations or automatic billing processes (including fill from open market option). Users will still be able to combine orders if they do it manually using the Order Entry screen. This setting applies to items in boxes and units.
Separate by Pick Ticket status orders created through Allocation or Automatic Billing
When this option is enabled, the system will validate if the pick ticket of an order has already been printed or not before adding items to it. In case the Pick ticket has already be printed, the system will add the items to a different order. This applies while billing items through any of the following processes:
Automatic Billing: after confirmation.
Allocations: Manual and mass allocations.
Fill from Open and Allocations from the Bulk Mode.
Units to Allocate from Prebook screens
Prebooks in Units pending to be billed: the system should not add the unit lines if it finds an order with Pick Ticket printed.
Delay days allowed
This option allows setting a number of days after the Ship Date of the Prebook, within which the system will still carry out the automatic billing, even if the product is delayed regarding the Ship Date of the Prebook.
Bill Units as Boxes
This option will only be available when the settings Sell By Units and the automatic billing are activated. It allows billing units as boxes. In other words, if the prebook is created in units and then the product is transferred from the Staging to the Inventory, the system must automatically bill that product in boxes instead of units.
In the case of multi-location companies, the system allows you to select the location where you want this option to apply:
Allow users to allocate multiple prebook lines with the same PO line
Once the Prebooks in units must be billed as the boxes option is enabled, the system will display an additional option called Allow users to allocate multiple prebook lines with the same PO line. If this option is enabled, the system will allow users to allocate under a single PO multiple Prebook lines having the same customer and carrier, even if the truck date is different. Once the user uses this option, the system will allocate using the same PO and different Prebooks. The Truck Date of the invoice will be given based on the Prebook with the most future date.
When leaving this option turned off, the system will only allow using the PO line for the first Prebook allocated.
After the setup is completed, you can create a Prebook in units and the PO will be created in boxes.
In the Bulk Purchasing Mode, the lines of the created prebook are split into UNITS by customer, date, and carrier in order to create the PO in boxes.
In the Staging area, the auto billing will be in boxes.
If a box line contains Prebooks with products in units, the system will bill automatically the lines with the same customer and carrier under the same invoice and its date will be taken from the truck date of the nearest Prebook in the Future. On the contrary, if some of the Prebook items within the box do not have the same information, the products will be left in the inventory and users will have to invoice them manually. Read Automatic Billing Issues for further information.
Invoice Consolidation
Once the automatic billing is running, the system will start creating invoices or using existing ones, considering the following:
Products will be consolidated to the same invoice as long as the customer name, truck date, customer PO number, ship to information is the same and the status of the invoice is still "pending" (and pick ticket status when the Separate by Pick Ticket status orders created through Allocation or Automatic Billing option has been enabled).
If the system finds an invoice previously created that matches the information mentioned above, the confirmed items will be added to that invoice.
If there is an invoice that matches that information, but it has open market items, the system will not add the confirmed items to that invoice but instead will create a new one.
warning: If the setting Consolidate Invoices on Automatic Billing is enabled for a given customer (see Customer Account "Advanced" Setup), the system will allow you to consolidate the invoices even if they are already confirmed. This setting overrides the invoicing policy set up in Invoice Options.
When a prebook has been manually allocated the system will validate which of the boxes are pending to be billed. This way when the product arrives and it gets confirmed from the Staging Area to Inventory, the system will only invoice the pending items and the rest of them will be released to open market.
If a prebook has an item at $0.00 the system will invoice it using the suggested sales price (landed cost plus the company's GPM).
Related Articles
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Administrator (Knowledge Base)
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Allocation Process - Bulk Purchase Mode (Knowledge Base)
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Automatic Billing & Allocations (Knowledge Base)
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Automatic Billing in Boxes - Prebooks in Units (Knowledge Base)
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Automatic Billing Issues (Knowledge Base)