Automatic Billing

Use the automatic billing process for invoicing those customers with Prebooks and Standing Orders 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. 

Manage Settings

To manage automatic billing and allocations settings, do the following instructions:

1. Go to Setup and select Settings.

2. Click on Automatic Billing and Allocations from the Order Entry group of settings.

3. Modify the settings.

4. Click on Save.

You can read details about every setting below.

Open

Automatic Billing and Allocations Settings

• 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 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 where the products from Prebooks or Standing Orders 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 can 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 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 can 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 the items shipped from different ports of origin in other orders. 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 before adding items to it. If the Pick ticket has already been 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 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.

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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 multiple Prebook lines with the same customer and carrier under a single PO, 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.

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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 abovementioned information, the confirmed items will be added to that invoice.

If an invoice matches that information but has open market items, the system will not add the confirmed items to that invoice but instead will create a new one.

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