See the article WORKFLOW: Billing Preparation & Management for information on the dues posting window, billing related tasks, and billing related reports

Understanding Automatic Billing

Billing runs automatically per the billing settings (below) you configure. 

The following three processes execute overnight automatically and together all contribute to the "Automatic Billing" Process: Daily Maintenance, Daily Dues Posting, and lastly Daily Billing

Daily Maintenance

Every night at 3:00 AM local time for each facility, daily maintenance will run to process status changes (freeze, thaw, terminate), promo expirations, and any other changes.

 

Daily Posting Dues

After Daily maintenance completes, dues invoices are posted for all customers with a "Next Bill" date of Today. 

Dues Posting Errors can occur and are reported via the Dues Posting Errors Report and should be followed up on asap because the contract did not post dues and did not move the next bill date forward.  

See the WORKFLOW: Billing Preparation & Management for info on setting up this report to be auto-emailed to you.

 

Daily Billing

After dues posting has finished for the day, a billing operation is dispatched at each facility each day.

The following Customers will have their open invoices and declined balances included in the daily billing when:

1. Customer has a contract with a Dues Posting today - ALL open and declined balances will be billed that day
    
2. It is a Sweep Billing Day - ALL open and declined balances will be billed that day
    
3. It's a Retry Decline day - X days after a charge declines, it is attempted again. Only customers with a decline are attempted on this day. Retrys are X days after both the dues posting day billing attempt AND Sweep billing day attempt.

IMPORTANT: Customers set to Manual Billing will NOT be run automatically and must be handled manually.  

Billing: General Settings

Configuration is PER LOCATION.

Go to Manage > Organization & Settings> Facility: [Location]> Billing to configure the billing settings.

Fixed Day of Month Sweep Billing Mode

This option is ideal for facilities that bill on a consistent schedule—such as once a month—using a fixed billing date for most/all of their plans.

1. Sweep Billing Mode: Select Fixed Days of Month to run billing.  
    
2. . Fixed Sweep Days of Month:  
   Sweep dates bill ALL open invoices and declined invoices, even if the customer does not have a dues posting that day.
   • Add your Monthly Billing Day (or at least one day) here AT MINIMUM. If you have NO sweep billing days, customers with prepaid contracts (and thus no dues postings to trigger billing) will NOT be automatically billed. You would need to manually bill them from the billing tab
      
3. (optional) Retry declined dues billing after X days 
   • Set the number of days to wait before retrying any declines from the previous billing operation. Customers with open invoices (not past due) are not charged on this date.
      
   • Retry Decline will occur X days after a billing attempt from a Dues Posting AND after billing attempts from Sweep Dates.
      
4. (optional) Only bill customers with an active contract 
   • If ON, customers with terminated contracts will NOT be billed in sweep billing automatically.  You could still go attempt to run the charge in View > Dues Posting & Billing, or write off the balance. 
     See setting below

Rolling Sweep Billing Mode

This option is ideal for facilities that primarily use a rolling billing schedule (ie Contract option in Plan > Big Edit > Billing tab), where each contract's billing date is set by the contract start date. 

For example, if a contract starts on the 12th, they pay their first full month of dues at sign up and dues will post and bill, along with any other open invoices on their account, on the 12th of each month. 

1. Sweep Billing Mode: select Rolling
    
2. Rolling Sweep Billing Interval Sweep intervals bill ALL open and declined invoices
   • All your recurring billed customers will bill all open invoices on their billing date and x days after that billing date per this setting.  
   • Open Invoices (on account) will bill x days after the invoice date
      
3. (optional) Retry declined dues billing after X days 
   • Set the number of days to wait before retrying any declined charges.  Retry will occur x days from that charge's last decline.
      
4. (optional) Only billing active contracts 
   • If ON, customers with terminated contracts will NOT be billed in sweep billing automatically.  You could still go attempt to run the charge in View > Dues Posting & Billing. 
     See setting below

Billing Config Settings

1. Weekly Billing Day
 

This sets the day of the week for weekly billed plans using the Facility Billing Date in the Plan:

Big Edit menu > Billing Tab. 


It is similar to having a monthly facility billing date (ie, the 1st).  Plans using this day of the week are prorated on sign up to this day of the week and are always billed on this day of the week.

2. Monthly Billing Day

Plans using the Facility Billing date in a Build > Plans > Big Edit > Billing tab will bill on this date. 

3. Enable Credit Card Surcharge (optional)

3a. Create a Product to use for your credit card surcharge and apply it here

3b. Set the percentage

This will apply a credit card surcharge to the Dues billed through the automatic billing operation when the stored payment method used is a credit card.  Surcharge will NOT apply to debit cards. 

Note that this surcharge does not apply to dues paid on-site at a terminal or during initial signup.

4. Only billing active contracts (optional)

If toggled ON: The Customer will not have their balance due billed automatically if their contract(s) are terminated/concluded. Concluded or terminated contract balances can still be manually billed through the billing area

• Use Case: If a facility does not write off balances then this toggle would potentially be of use. Payment processors charge a fee for every payment attempt regardless of if it is approved or declined.
   

If toggle is OFF: ALL open and past due balances will be attempted per your sweep schedule, regardless of whether the contact(s) the customer has are active/frozen or terminated/concluded. 

If you want to stop attempting to bill the balance for a customer, you can:

• Write off the balance
• Void the open invoices to clear the balance
• Remove the stored payment method (and optionally terminate the contract) to leave the balance due but STOP automatic billing attempts

Sales Tax Assigned to Products (if needed)

Whether a product is taxed depends on the setting for the Product.  

Confirm sales tax is set on all your products as needed.  

• Products module > Product List tab > see the Sales Tax Column to see what is currently applied
• Edit product > Sales Tax Tab to apply the correct Tax Group.  
  Remember, Tax Groups are configured in Manage > Organization & Facility Settings > Tax Groups

Email Notifications: Dues Posting & Decline Emails

Dues Posting Email

If a customer wants to get dues posting emails, the following must be configured:

1. In the plan on the Customer Notifications Spoke, the Dues Posting Email toggle must be on

2. On the Customer's Record, the Dues Posting toggle in Edit Customer on the General tab should be toggled on.  This toggle is off for all customers by default and can only be enabled by staff.
 

Configure the default template in Build > Notifications > Templates > Dues Posting (Recurring Only)

Decline Email

Make sure you have reviewed and updated your Decline email template.

We recommend you include a screenshot of your web portal and the Payment Methods tab to help the customer get to the right place.

Linking to your portal log in page (or your direct web page where they can log into the portal) in the footer can also be helpful.

Configure the default template in Build > Notifications > Templates > Declined Billing

ACH Payments and Declined Billing

ACH payments will show as unsettled until a response is received from the bank.

If an ACH payment declines, the contract holder automatically has these two toggles enabled (Customer Record > Big Edit at top center of record).  

• Exclude From Account Billing means that automatic billing will NOT attempt to charge their ACH on file again, preventing possible overdraft fees for the customer.
• Resume billing toggle ensures that both these toggles will be disabled (and the customer resumes attempting to bill per your billing settings) once the balance returns to $0 OR a new payment method is added to the customer's record by staff or online.  

Manually override and attempt to bill ACH again

1. Go to the customer record and disable the Exclude from account billing toggle. Save.
2. On the Customer Record click Charge Balance Now to charge to their pay method on file.