Billing and Finances

Smart BSS includes a charging module which, based on telecommunication services, reached a very high level of versatility to suit any kind of subscription-based or charging-based service. Each customer's account can have multiple pockets attributed to distinct units of payment such as currency, cryptocurrency, items (minutes/SMS/megabytes, videos to play, points exchangeable, one-off service or packages). This allows the introduction of prepaid and post-paid options with credit, loyalty points, and promos, such as "bring a friend" in which customer gets credit for introducing a new customer, along with multitenancy for wholesale.

Another option supported by Smart BSS is usage-based billing. In this solution, the EDR (event data record) or CDR (call data record) is imported, parsed, mapped onto the services and then priced according to defined tariffs. The solution allows control over type and time frame of objects charged on the basis of volume used. The described mass process is automated, can be run daily and is secured by the detection of errors that triggers alerts if EDR or CDR cannot be processed properly. These mechanisms ensure seamless billing in either prepaid, post-paid, hybrid or subscription-based models, and facilitate the introduction of vouchers and mixed-model solutions. The additional billing options include choosing whether subscriptions should be billed at the end of a billing cycle or in advance, proportionally to the number of days the service has been in use.

Smart BSS allows single invoicing and running a mass process to generate, accept or cancel, issue, and send invoices for multiple accounts for the chosen billing cycle. All invoices are then accessible though one panel with advanced search options (search by amount, dates, status, reseller, billing cycle, dunning state, etc.) for further management and analysis. The Billing and Finance module is integrated with the Smart BSS CRM platform, where you can find comprehensive information about each invoice including the details, history, payments, disputes, notifications, and a link to the CRM customer account info page. Customers can manage their payments through a Selfcare platform. 

Smart BSS also provides a mass dunning process, which aim to ensure timely payments by the customer. An automatic mass process generates a list of customers whose payments failed. Debt collection is automatically disabled when a bill is paid or the account is marked to be omitted. The process can be customized regarding the number of dunning levels, type of reaction at each level, messaging agent frequency and the text of messages.  In addition, the system keeps track of customer payment patterns for the authorities.