How to
How to set up recurring billing on a service point
A water system bills connections, not people. The tap at the end of the road gets a bill every quarter whoever lives there, so the schedule belongs on the connection. In BasicBMS that connection is a service point, and the service point holds everything a bill needs: who the customer is today, which rate to charge, which invoice layout to print on, and when to bill. Set it up once and each run builds the bill from those four things.
Before you start
- The service point exists, with its address and, if it's metered, an installed meter.
- A rate item is set up for it. See how to set up a water rate (linked below).
- The company has an Invoice template for these bills, such as one named "Quarterly". It sets the layout and wording the customer sees.
- The customer record exists, with their delivery preference (email or paper) set.
Steps
Open Metering → Service Points and open the point.
Check Customer:. This is who the next bill goes to, so it should name the person billed today.
Set Billing Method: to Metered if usage is billed from reads, or Flat if the point pays fixed charges only.
Pick the rate in Rate Item:. The picker lists Rate items only.
Pick the layout in Invoice Template: (it reads Select an invoice template... until you choose one). It lists the company's Invoice templates.
Click Save. A small open-link icon now sits beside Customer, Rate Item and Invoice Template; each one opens that record.
In the Billing section, which says No billing schedule. Set one up to bill this point on a recurring cycle., click Set up billing schedule. The schedule editor opens right there. Its Entity reads like "ServicePoint - SP-1054"; clicking it brings you back to the point.
Give the schedule a Title, set the Start Date to the first bill date, and under Recurrence: choose Monthly with Every 3 month(s) for quarterly billing (or 1 for monthly). Leave Ends on Never. Click Save.
Back on the point, the Billing section shows one line: the schedule's title, how often it repeats, its start date and its status, with an Edit schedule button. If anything is still missing you get a warning instead, such as "Bills on this schedule will fail until the point has an invoice template, a rate item." Fill in what it names and save.
What each run does. On every date the schedule falls on, BasicBMS builds a new bill from the point's Invoice Template, made out to the customer the point names on that day, priced from its Rate Item, with the service point printed in the header. Then it does what every recurring bill does: adds a late fee if late fees are on, adds a payment link, posts to the ledger, makes the PDF, charges the card if the customer has auto-charge on, and emails or queues it for print by their delivery preference. On a Metered point, the usage from its unbilled reads goes on the same bill.
Where to watch it. Billing → Dashboard lists each bill with the service point number (SP-xxxx) under the customer's name. Configs lists every billing schedule, and a service point's row links back to the point.
What posts behind it
Each run posts its bill like any invoice. A $150.00 quarterly flat bill:
| Account | Debit | Credit | |
|---|---|---|---|
| DR | Accounts Receivable | 150.00 | — |
| CR | The rate item's GL Sales account (or GL Defaults Inventory Sales) | — | 150.00 |
| Balanced | 150.00 | 150.00 |
Setting up the schedule posts nothing. Money moves on the run date.
When it won’t let you
Service point SP-1054 has no invoice template A run found the point incomplete, so no bill went out. The Billing → Dashboard row is marked Failed with this reason. The same check reports a point with no customer or no rate item, and a rate item with no price. Fix the point; the next run bills normally.
Service point SP-1054 is inactive — cancel its billing schedule or reactivate it The point was deactivated with a schedule still running. Decide which one you meant.
Occurrence 01/01/2027 has already been completed An occurrence is a day, and each day bills once. Generating the same date again is refused, so a double click can't double-bill a customer.
01/15/2027 is not an occurrence of this schedule The date asked for isn't one the schedule falls on.
This service point has a billing schedule. Cancel or delete the schedule first, or mark the point inactive. A point that is still billing can't be deleted. Cancelling the schedule stops its bills.
What this doesn't do
The schedule bills; it doesn't decide who owes what when a house sells. Changing Customer: sends the next bill to the new owner, and a mid-cycle move-out is a final bill (linked below). A schedule saved with no recurrence shows One-time (not recurring) and bills once. Invoice-based recurring bills still exist for businesses that bill people rather than connections; utilities that used them were moved onto their service points on upgrade, with the same customers, amounts and wording.
Related
Stuck on this one? Call (509) 955-0770 and we'll walk through it with you.
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