Consolidated Billing Invoices(R11i) versus Balance Forward Billing (R12) - Similarities and

Differences

The following table summarizes the differences and similarities between CBI and BFB, following the table
are screenshots to further illustrate the points highlighted in the table.

TABLE SUMMARY

Detail Similarity or Description

Difference
SET-UP
Billing Cycle Difference BFB: Requires definition of billing cycle

CBI: No concept of billing cycle

Payment Terms Similarity Both BFB and CBI requires setting-up a payment term to be used with the
feature
Difference BFB: Requires associating a Billing Cycle with a payment term to imply that
payment term is BFB-enabled

CBI: Requires definition of a cut-off date to imply payment term is a Proxima

term to be used in CBI.
Difference BFB: the cut-off date concept is implemented via the billing cycle definition,
and this allows for multiple cut-off dates per billing cycle.

CBI: allows only one Cut-off Date

Customer Profile Similarity Both features allow set-up of default values to be used in Customer records by
Classes creating a Customer profile class
Difference BFB: In addition to enabling the feature, requires defining the Level at which
BFB will be done: Account or Site. For Account level, BFB can consolidate
across bill-to sites

CBI: has no concept of Level, consolidation occurs only at the Site level, CBI
cannot consolidate across multiple bill-to sites.
Customer Record Similarity For both features, when customer profile class is used, the feature’s settings
are defaulted from the profile class into the customer record but the values can
be overridden if necessary
Difference BFB: When override terms checkbox is checked, this allows users to create
transactions for this BFB-customer that do not use BFB terms. This essentially
allows the user to create transactions that will not be included in the
BFB.When override terms checkbox is unchecked, all transactions for this site
default to the BFB term and user cannot change it.

CBI: Override terms, User’s guide advises to uncheck this – so that all
transactions for the site will have uniform payment terms. However, when it is
not checked, user can enter any payment term and yet it will be pulled into the
CBI. The term associated to the transaction however will still maintain the
original payment term. e.g. CBI Term = Due 10th, invoice has term
IMMEDIATE, the invoice will still be included in the CBI.
IMPACT ON
TRANSACTION
WORKBENCH
Additional Similarity For both BFB and CBI, when enabled, beside the Number prompt are 2 fields,
Identification number the first is the BFB/CBI number, the 2nd is the original transaction number.
You can query for transactions using either the BFB/CBI number or the
transaction number.
Term Difference BFB: When a transaction is pulled into a BFB, the payment term reflected on
the transaction will match the payment term associated to the BFB. If the
original payment term of the transaction was different, it will be overridden
during the BFB generation process, and the BFB term will be used.

CBI: Even if a transaction with a different payment term is pulled into a CBI,
the transaction will retain its original payment term
Printing Option Difference BFB: If user sets Printing Option to DO NOT PRINT, the transaction will be
excluded from the BFB, even if it has a BFB payment term

CBI: There is no way to exclude a transaction from a CBI, once the site of the
transaction is CBI-enabled.
View Icon Difference BFB: When the view icon is invoked, and the transaction has been pulled into
a BFB, the BFB document will be presented. If the transaction has not been
pulled into a BFB, it will show the invoice document.

CBI: When the view icon is invoked, the Invoice document will be presented,
whether or not the transaction is included in a CBI or not.
Billing Date Difference BFB: When a transaction uses a BFB term, the field Billing Date is dynamically
displayed.

CBI: There is no concept of billing date.

PROCESSING
Navigation Path Similarity For both BFB and CBI, you navigate to Print Documents
Concurrent Difference BFB: Is controlled by 3 processes:
Processes 1) BPA Balance Forward Print Program
2) Confirm Balance Forward Bills (accept/reject)
3) Generate Balance Forward Bills (draft/final)

CBI: Is controlled by 5 processes:

1) Accept
2) Print Draft
3) Print New
4) Reject
5) Reprint
Output Difference BFB: Output is generated via Bill Presentment Architecture using templates.
This allows users to customize how the BFB document looks. There are 2
seeded templates provided: Detail and Summary. BFB also provides aging
information

CBI: Output is generated via ARXCBI.rdf, layout is hard-coded. CBI does not
provide aging information.
Accept/Reject Similarity For both features, if the document is printed in DRAFT, user needs to Accept
or Reject, before subsequent documents can be generated.
DATA MODEL
AR_CONS_INV* Similarity All data pertaining to BFB or CBI are stored in AR_CONS_INV* tables.

SET-UP
Payment Terms

BFB: Requires set-up of a Billing Cycle and Payment term.

In the billing cycle you can specify a billing frequency of Daily, Weekly or Monthly. For each cycle you
can define one or more cut-off dates. This example, has 2 cut-off dates, 4th and 18th.

This billing cycle has to be associated to a Payment term (as shown next) to indicate when it is Due.

In the following screenshot, invoices using this payment term will have billing date either on the 4th or
18th of the month, and will be due 10 days after the billing date.

For example, an invoice created on the 3rd will have a billing date of the 4th and be due on the 14th. An
invoice created on the 15th will have a billing date of the 18th and be due on the 28th.
Further, instead of specifying Due Days as shown above, you can also specify a Day of Month and
Months ahead as shown in the next screenshot.

In this set-up, the same billing cycle BFB MONTHLY is used, but the Due date is different. e.g. an invoice
created on the 3rd will have a billing date of the 4th and an invoice created on the 15th will have a billing
date of the 18th, then both invoices will be due on the 15th of next month.
CBI: Requires set-up of a proxima payment term where you can specify one value in Cutoff Day: Day of
Month or check Last day of month to be the cut-off date. Then you indicate on what day of the month,
how many months ahead the due date would be.

In this example, if you ran CBI on the 15th of the month, all invoices created prior to the 10th of the
month, will be included in the CBI and will be due on the 10th of next month.
CUSTOMER PROFILE CLASSES

For both BFB and CBI, you can define settings for the feature in a customer profile class, this makes it
easier to default values into customer records as you create them.

BFB: You need to enable the feature, then define the Level at which BFB will be done (Account or Site)
and Type (Detail, Summary or Imported)
CBI: You need to enable the feature, and define the Type: Detail, Summary or Imported
CUSTOMER RECORD

BFB: When Bill level = Account, settings for BFB created at the Site level will then be ignored. When
Override Terms is unchecked, all invoices for this site will use the BFB term associated to the customer
profile. If Override Terms is checked, users are allowed to enter non-BFB terms when creating invoices
for this customer. This allows the flexibility of excluding some invoices of this customer from being
included in a BFB.
CBI: At either the Account or Site level, define the CBI settings at the Profile:Document Printing Tab. The
settings at the Account level, will default into the Site level but can be changed. It is also advised that in
the Profile:Transaction tab to not check the Override Terms, this will enable the code to default the CBI
payment term for all invoices for this site. This ensures all invoices will have a uniform term.
IMPACT ON TRANSACTION WORKBENCH

BFB: There are 2 fields beside the Number prompt, in the first field, you can enter BFB to query
transactions pulled into a BFB. The second field contains the original transaction number.

A new field Billing date dynamically displays in the transaction form when the payment term is BFB
enabled.

CBI: There are 2 fields beside the Number prompt, the first value is the CBI number, and the second
value is the original transaction number. If the CBI number is populated then that means that the
transaction is pulled into a CBI. Note in the screenshot below, that even though IMMEDIATE is NOT a
CBI term, this invoice was included in the CBI anyway, and yet the original term was retained.
PROCESSING

BFB: Following are the options available when navigating to Print Documents – Balance Forward Billing.
CBI: Following are the options available when navigating to Print Documents – Consolidated Billing
invoice
SAMPLE OUTPUT

BFB: Provides information on the transactions pulled into the BFB, Beginning and Ending balances as
well as Aging information.
CBI: Provides a text format listing of transactions pulled into the CBI, Beginning and Ending balances, but
no aging information.