Oracle Order Management enables you to bill your customers on a recurring basis for standard items they are ordering on a sales order line. When you are entering a sales order you can create a billing plan for the sales order line. When you create the billing plan you can specify a fixed number of billing plan lines, an indefinite number of billing plan lines, or milestone-based billing plan lines. If you choose a fixed number of billing plan lines, you then enter parameters for the billing plan, including billing period, billing frequency, start date, billing amount, and number of billing plan lines. If you choose an indefinite number of billing plan lines, the parameters for the billing plan include billing period, billing frequency, start date, and billing amount. If you choose milestone-based billing plan lines, you enter parameters for the billing plan including milestone, bill percent or bill amount, and bill date for user-defined milestones.
After you have created a billing plan associated with a fixed number or indefinite number of billing plan lines, before the billing lines can be created you must close the sales order source order line. After the sales order source order line is closed, you can then manually run or have the system periodically run the Create Billing Lines concurrent program. The Create Billing Lines concurrent program creates bill only (based on default setup) sales order lines for each of the billing plan lines associated with the billing plan in the same sales order as the billing plan. These bill only lines interface data to Oracle Accounts Receivable which then creates the invoices against them. This concurrent program only creates bill only lines for billing plan lines where the source order line is closed, the billing plan status is Billing in Progress or Open, and the system date is greater than or equal to the bill date on the billing plan line. As the recurring billing process goes along, you can view the billing plan to view the amounts you have billed to your customers and the amounts you have yet to bill to your customers. After the last billing plan line associated with the billing plan is invoiced the billing plan status is automatically changed to Closed.
When you are creating a billing plan associated with milestone-based billing plan lines you can select predefined milestones and user-defined milestones. If you choose predefined milestones, the system automatically populates the bill date for a milestone billing plan line as the different milestones occur for the source sales order line. If you choose user-defined milestones, then you must manually enter the bill date for each billing plan line or use the PO API to generate the bill date. After you have created a billing plan associated with milestone-based billing plan lines, you must book the source sales order before the billing lines can be created. As the different milestones occur for the source sales order line, you can then manually run or have the system periodically run the Create Billing Lines concurrent program. The Create Billing Lines concurrent program creates bill-only (based on the default setup) sales order lines for each of the billing plan lines associated with the billing plan in the same sales order as the billing plan. These bill-only lines interface data to Oracle Accounts Receivable, which then creates the invoices against them. This concurrent program only creates bill-only lines for billing plan lines when all of the following criteria are met:
The source order line is booked.
The bill date is available on the billing plan line.
The billing line is not generated.
The billing plan status is Billing in Progress or Open.
The system date is greater than or equal to the bill date on the billing plan line.
As the recurring billing process goes along, you can view the billing plan to view the amounts you have billed to your customers and the amounts you have yet to bill. After the last billing plan line associated with the billing plan is invoiced the billing plan status is automatically changed to Closed.
Note: The major difference between fixed number and indefinite number and milestone-based billing plans is that with milestone-based billing plans the source sales order line does not need to be closed; it only needs to be booked before you can create billing lines using the Create Billing Lines concurrent program.
For all billing plan types, until the billing plan is closed, you can make modifications to the billing plan for which billing sales order lines have not been created. This includes deleting individual plan lines or terminating all of the billing plan lines at once. Your customers may also fully or partially return items from the sales orders line associated with a billing plan. Periodically, you may need to review or make changes to the billing plan to accommodate those changes that have occurred against the sales orders lines. If all of the quantity of an item has been returned on an RMA, the system terminates the billing plan which in turn stops the invoicing of the customer.
Note: The recurring billing feature does not incorporate any changes to existing revenue and COGS recognition functionality in E-Business Suite. If required, it is expected that you are responsible for implementing any related changes.
These are basic process flows when using recurring billing in Oracle Order Management:
Create a sales order and a sales order line for a standard item using the Sales Order window in Oracle Order Management.
Create a billing plan associated to the sales order line using the Billing Plan page in Oracle Order Management.
When creating the billing plan you can define a fixed number of billing plan lines or an indefinite number of billing plan lines. You can also specify whether you want billing validation to occur.
For more information on how to create billing plans, see Recurring Billing User Procedures.
Ship (book, pick, and ship confirm), fulfill and close the sales order line associated with the billing plan to the customer in Oracle Order Management.
Run the Create Billing Lines concurrent program in Oracle Order Management.
Oracle recommends that this program be scheduled to run periodically to not require any user intervention.
For more information about the Creating Billing Lines concurrent program, see Create Billing Lines Concurrent Program.
Progress the billing lines to invoices in Oracle Accounts Receivable.
Periodically review the billing plan to view the progress of the billing plan using the Billing Plan page in Oracle Order Management.
Using the Billing Plan page you can view the amount billed and the amounts yet to be billed. When the last billing plan line is billed, the billing plan status is changed to Closed. No more billing can occur against this billing plan.
For more information about viewing billing plans, see Recurring Billing User Procedures.
Create an RMA for the item on the sales order line associated to the billing plan, if the customer returns a partial or full quantity of the item in Oracle Order Management.
Terminate the remaining billing plan lines that have yet to be billed using the Billing Plan page in Oracle Order Management.
Note: If you create an RMA for the full quantity, the system automatically terminates the billing plan and deletes the remaining billing plan lines that are yet to be billed.
For more information about terminating billing plans, see Recurring Billing User Procedures.
Use the Sales Order window in Oracle Order Management to create a sales order and a sales order line for a standard item.
Use the Billing Plan page in Oracle Order Management to create a billing plan associated with the sales order line.
When you create the billing plan you can define milestone-based billing plan lines. You can also specify whether you want billing validation to occur.
For user-defined milestones, enter the bill date for the billing plan line either manually or using the PO API.
For more information about how to create billing plans, see "Recurring Billing User Procedures".
Perform a milestone (such as booking, fulfillment, customer acceptance, or any user-defined milestone) for the source order line on the sales order. Before the first billing line can be created you must first book the sales order.
For predefined milestones, the system automatically populates the Bill Date field on the billing plan line in the billing plan as the milestone is reached.
Note: For a milestone-based billing plan, the source sales order line does not need to be Closed before the billing lines can be created.
Run the Create Billing Lines concurrent program in Oracle Order Management.
Oracle recommends that this program be scheduled to run periodically.
For more information about the Creating Billing Lines concurrent program, see "Create Billing Lines Concurrent Program".
Progress the billing lines to invoices in Oracle Accounts Receivable.
Use the Billing Plan page in Oracle Order Management to periodically review the progress of the billing plan.
Using the Billing Plan page you can view the amount billed and the amounts yet to be billed. When the last billing plan line is billed, the billing plan status is changed to Closed. No more billing can occur against this billing plan.
For more information about viewing billing plans, see "Recurring Billing User Procedures".
Repeat Step 3 through Step 6 until all of the milestones have been reached and the sales order source line is closed.
If the customer returns a partial or full quantity of the item:
Create an RMA in Oracle Order Management for the item on the sales order line associated with the billing plan.
If the return was for a partial quantity, terminate the remaining billing plan lines that have yet to be billed using the Billing Plan page in Oracle Order Management.
Note: If you create an RMA for the full quantity, the system automatically terminates the billing plan and deletes the billing plan lines that are yet to be billed.
For more information about terminating billing plans, see "Recurring Billing User Procedures".
These are the statuses for a billing plan:
| Billing Plan Status | Description |
|---|---|
| Open | Initial status of a billing plan. Billing has not started yet. Billing plan information can be updated. |
| Billing in Progress | Billing has started per the associated billing plan. At least one billing line on the billing plan has been billed. Billing plan information can be updated. |
| Closed | Billing is complete for all billing plan lines in the billing plan. Billing plan information cannot be updated. |
| Terminated | You have manually terminated the billing plan to stop further billing, or an RMA (with full quantity) has been created against the source order line. Billing plan information cannot be updated. |
| Review Required | You are expected to review the billing plan because changes to quantity and amount has happened to source order line, or RMA with partial quantity has been created when billing is in progress. In this status, you can review and update the billing plan with respect to bill dates, amounts, and so on. |