9 Configuring the Billing Cutoff Time

Learn how to configure Oracle Communications Billing and Revenue Management (BRM) to use a billing cutoff time other than midnight.

Topics in this document:

About Configuring the BRM Cutoff Time

By default, BRM defines the business day as starting at 12:00:00 a.m. and ending at 11:59:59 p.m. For example, if you run billing at any time on December 5, billing is performed for all activity that occurred until 11:59:59 p.m. on December 4 for the accounts to be billed.

You can change the cutoff time to start your billing activity at any time of the day. For example, if you set the cutoff time to 10 a.m., activity for events that occurred before 10 a.m. are billed.

Figure 9-1 shows how billing works for different cutoff times:

Figure 9-1 Billing Cutoff Time

Description of Figure 9-1 follows
Description of "Figure 9-1 Billing Cutoff Time"

Changing the cutoff time does not just change how billing works; it changes how all activities in BRM work, including accounting and billing cycles, usage rating, cycle fees, proration, general ledger posting, and searches. The cutoff time is used for all accounts.

How Billing and Invoicing Are Affected by Changing the Cutoff Time

  • The start and end dates for accounting and billing cycles are based on the cutoff time. For example, if the cutoff time is 10:00 a.m., a customer who creates an account at 9:00 a.m. on December 5 has a billing date of December 4.

  • The following utilities run by the pin_bill_day script use the cutoff time to calculate the billing periods:

    • pin_deferred_act

    • pin_bill_accts

    • pin_collect

    • pin_refund

    • pin_inv_accts

    • pin_deposit

    • pin_cycle_fees

  • When searching for accounts, the pin_inv_accts, pin_inv_send, and pin_inv_export utilities use the cutoff time to calculate the start and end times for flagging accounts to be invoiced.

How Rating Is Affected by Changing the Cutoff Time

  • When you define start and end times for any pricing component (for example, the start and end times for a discount), BRM uses the cutoff time. For example, if you specify that a discount is valid until December 5 and the cutoff time is 10:00 a.m., the discount is valid until 10:00 a.m. on December 5.

  • You can set up special charges for events that occur on certain days. BRM uses the cutoff time to determine which day an event is assigned to.

How General Ledger (G/L) Is Affected by Changing the Cutoff Time

When searching for events for collecting G/L information and generating G/L reports, the pin_ledger_report utility uses the cutoff time to calculate the start and end times for the G/L report.

How Timestamp Fields Are Affected by Changing the Cutoff Time

Many BRM features use timestamps to determine how to perform activities. Timestamps are usually rounded to midnight. If you change the cutoff time, the timestamp is rounded to the cutoff time instead.

Note:

The cutoff time is also considered while setting the timestamp values for product offering start and end dates.

These fields affect the accounting cycle dates:

  • PIN_FLD_ACTG_LAST_T

  • PIN_FLD_ACTG_NEXT_T

  • PIN_FLD_ACTG_FUTURE_T

These fields affect rating and proration:

  • PIN_FLD_PURCHASE_START_T

  • PIN_FLD_PURCHASE_END_T

  • PIN_FLD_USAGE_START_T

  • PIN_FLD_USAGE_END_T

  • PIN_FLD_CYCLE_START_T

  • PIN_FLD_CYCLE_END_T

These fields affect billing cycle dates:

  • PIN_FLD_LAST_BILL_T

  • PIN_FLD_NEXT_BILL_T

Configuring the Billing Cutoff Time

Note:

After you set the cutoff time, you cannot change it in a production system.

To configure the billing cutoff time:
  1. Enable time-stamp rounding. See "Configuring Time-Stamp Rounding". You do not need to stop and restart the Connection Manager (CM) at the end of the procedure, although you may do so if you want.

  2. Go to BRM_home/sys/data/config.

  3. Use the following command to create an editable XML file from the billing instance of the /config/business_params object: 

    pin_bus_params -r BusParamsBilling bus_params_billing.xml

    This command creates an XML file named bus_params_billing.xml.out in your current directory. If you do not want this file in your current directory, specify the path as part of the file name.

  4. In bus_params_billing.xml.out, set BillingCycleOffset to the desired cutoff time:
    <BillingCycleOffset>value</BillingCycleOffset>

    For example, to set the cutoff time to 10:00 a.m., set the value as 10. The default is 0 (midnight).

    Caution:

    BRM uses the XML in this file to overwrite the existing instance of the /config/business_params object. If you delete or modify any other parameters in the file, these changes affect the associated aspects of the BRM configuration.

  5. Save and exit the file.

  6. Rename the bus_params_billing.xml.out file to bus_params_billing.xml.

  7. Use the following command to load your changes into the /config/business_params object:
    pin_bus_params bus_params_billing.xml

    You should run this command from the BRM_home/sys/data/config directory, which includes support files used by the utility. To run it from a different directory, see "pin_bus_params" in BRM Developer's Guide.

  8. Read the object with the testnap utility or the Object Browser to verify that all fields are correct.

    For general instructions on using testnap, see "Using the testnap Utility to Test BRM" in BRM Developer's Guide. For information on how to use Object Browser, see "Reading Objects" in BRM Developer's Guide.

  9. Stop and restart the CM.

    For more information, see "Starting and Stopping the BRM System" in BRM System Administrator's Guide.