Outbound Billing

Outbound billing generates billing records for batches (ICLs) that are sent. As batches (ICLs) are processed by Distribution, the assigned endpoint is associated with a customer and outbound product code. When the transmission is sent by Gateway (outbound), the Transaction Server initiates an event that sends a message to Services Framework. This message tells Services Framework to run the outbound billing task for the processed batch (ICL).

Outbound billing determines if it the batch (ICL) was already processed. If it was, it is not processed again. If the batch (ICL) has not been billed, outbound billing accesses the outbound product associated with the endpoint and determines if billing is active for the product. If billing is active and the product has billing codes defined, outbound billing generates transmission and batch (ICL) billing records. It also generates a summary transaction billing record for each transaction billing code in the batch (ICL). Multiple transaction billing records may be generated for a batch (ICL) since each transaction in the batch (ICL) is assigned a batch (ICL) billing code.

Outbound billing determines if the outbound product has any services defined. If it does and receiving customers are subscribed to the service, outbound billing generates transmission, batch (ICL), and transaction level billing records for the services to which the customers are subscribed. The type of outbound service affects how the transaction billing records are generated. The types are:

Archive: All transactions in the batch (ICL) are included in the transaction billing record
Addendum Billing: For each transaction in the batch (ICL), the number of addendum records that match the addendum types specified in the service are billed to the originator of the transaction
Delivery (with a cutoff time specified): All transactions are included in the transaction billing record if the delivery time of the batch (ICL) is before the cutoff time
Delivery (without a cutoff time specified): Transactions in the batch (ICL) are included in the batch (ICL) billing record
Repair: Transactions in the batch (ICL) that were repaired are included in the transaction billing record

When outbound billing processing completes, it sets the state of the batch (ICL) to billed.

At the start of each new business day, outbound billing is called. At that time, it looks for all endpoints that subscribe to an outbound product that has a daily billing code. It generates a billing record for each subscribed endpoint with the outbound product found. This process is repeated for all subscription services in a product.

Outbound billing can be run manually. When it runs manually, it looks for all inbound transmissions that are not yet processed and submits a request to Services Framework to process them. For more information about running the outbound billing task manually, see Run Task Operation page.