Billing Account Hierarchy

When dealing with larger companies that have multiple departments, divisions or subsidiaries, having multiple billing accounts can be extremely beneficial in various scenarios. For instance, an organization may wish to track the budgets and expenses of certain departments through separate billing accounts, or multiple subsidiaries may need to use the same billing information. Additionally, some companies may require the billing process to be split based on different regions, products or currencies.

 

Nue accommodates two primary scenarios to fulfill the mentioned requirements:

1. A single sales account associated with multiple billing accounts;
2. Multiple sales accounts use a shared billing account.

 

A single sales account with multiple billing accounts

In Salesforce, Nue utilizes a single Account object for both sales and billing purposes. Typically, this account is referred to as a 'Sales Account' and is managed by sales representatives to oversee the sales process. If you create another account and link it to the sales account through the Related Account (Ruby__RelatedAccount__c) junction object, the newly created account will be recognized as a 'Billing Account' for the associated 'Sales Account'.

 

Suppose you have a sales account called 'Nue'. In this case, it will automatically be used for billing purposes. However, if you want to bill some of its orders using a different account, you can create a new billing account called 'Nue - Billing Account' and link it to the 'Nue' sales account. This will allow you to select a different billing account when creating an order, and thus process billing through different billing accounts

 

NOTE    A Sales Account is also treated as a Billing Account. This means that when placing an order for a sales account, it will be used as the order's billing account by default.

 

You can add the billing account 'Nue - Billing Account' to the sales account 'Nue' on its detail page.

 

 

Now on the customer's lifecycle manager of sales account 'Nue', you should be able to see the associated billing account 'Nue - Billing Account' as well.

 

 

Use different billing accounts when creating a quote or an order

By default, the billing account for a quote or order will match the sales account. However, if the customer has multiple billing accounts, you have the option to select a different one during the quote or order creation process. Once the quote is finalized and converted into an order, the selected billing account will be carried over to the newly generated order as well.

 

When you select a billing account, you will see the billing accounts that are already associated with the current sales account listed under the 'RELATED BILLING ACCOUNTS' section. You can also choose any account that is not a billing account of the current sales account from the 'OTHER ACCOUNTS' section. After the quote is finalized into an active order, the selected account will automatically become a billing account of the sales account.

 

 

Bill subscriptions with different billing accounts

Upon order activation, the resulting subscriptions will carry the billing account details from the orders. During each billing cycle, when billing jobs are executed, invoices will be generated based on the billing account linked to each subscription. For example, if a customer named 'Nue' has two subscriptions—one using 'Nue' as the billing account directly and the other associated with a separate billing account called 'Nue - Billing Account'—the two subscriptions will be billed separately. Consequently, there will be a distinct invoice generated for each billing account.

 

Multiple sales account use a shared billing account

It is also common for different departments, divisions, or subsidiaries to share the same billing account. This can help streamline the payment process and simplify accounting procedures for the organization as a whole. For instance, individual departments may buy products or services from a vendor independently, but the organization will receive a combined invoice for all the items purchased by its various departments.

 

Sales account hierarchy

Salesforce supports the account hierarchy, you can build your sales account hierarchy via the Parent Account field. For example, the customer 'Nue' has two subsidiaries 'Nue - San Francisco' and 'Nue - Los Angeles', you can create two child accounts and link them to 'Nue' as a parent account.

 

 

 

Now when you navigate to the customer lifecycle for 'Nue', you can see all its related child accounts and billing accounts:

 

 

Bill multiple sales accounts with the same billing account

When generating quotes and orders, users can choose to use the billing accounts of the customer's parent account if it exists. This allows multiple child accounts to share the same billing account associated with their parent.

 

Let's consider an example of creating orders for two customers - 'Nue - San Francisco' and 'Nue - Los Angeles'. By default, the billing accounts for these orders are the customers themselves. However, if 'Nue' wishes to streamline the payment and accounting process, when creating the orders, users can choose to set the billing account to the parent account's billing account - 'Nue - Billing Account'.

 

 

Then the orders and the generated subscriptions for each child account will have the same billing account information.

 

 

In the next billing cycle, the orders will be billed together through the billing account 'Nue - Billing Account'

 

 

Set up billing schedules using billing accounts

When configuring a billing schedule, you can filter for specific accounts to generate invoices exclusively for them.

 

If a sales account is linked to multiple billing accounts, all subscriptions associated with those billing accounts will be billed together. Additionally, you have the option to include subsidiaries in the billing process. For instance, if you run a billing schedule for 'Nue' and select the 'Include Subsidiaries' option, subscriptions for 'Nue - San Francisco' and 'Nue - Los Angeles' will also be billed.

 

Change billing account

When a company undergoes organizational restructuring or acquires other companies, it may be necessary to transfer existing subscriptions from one billing account to another. In this case, users can change the billing account of a subscription when checking out any changes to a change order. After the change order is activated, the subscription will be billed through the new billing account.

 

Additional Notes

• If account B is linked to account A through the Related Account (Ruby__RelatedAccount__c) junction object, account B will be considered a billing account for account A. Nue does not have any limitations on billing accounts, so you can still use it for managing sales processes, creating orders and subscriptions, and so on. However, we suggest separating the use of sales and billing accounts if you need multiple billing accounts for a customer.
• When processing billing for customers, the generated invoices will be based on the associated billing accounts instead of the customers themselves. For example, customer A has linked billing accounts B and C, if you run a billing job for customer A, the generated invoices will be grouped by billing accounts B and C.
• If multiple sales accounts share the same billing account, by default, the generated invoices will be grouped by the billing account. But users can choose to generate invoices for each sales account separately by enabling the 'Sales Account' billing group attribute from Nue System Settings -> Billing -> Billing Groups. For more details, please refer to Billing Groups.
• When you create a quote or order, you are able to choose any billing accounts connected to the current sales account and its ancestor accounts by default. If you need to customize the available options, you can add a lookup filter plugin to the Billing Account field on the Quote or Order object. To learn more about how to add a lookup filter plugin, please refer to this article.

Summary view in the lifecycle manager

Within the customer's Lifecycle Manager, the 'General' table offers an aggregated perspective of an account, available in Grid View, List View, and Summary View formats, provided the current account has associated children sales accounts or billing accounts.

 

The fields visible in any of these views are governed by a field set named "Customer Fields" within the Account object in Salesforce. To tailor the layout of these views, you can configure the fields included in this field set, and their sort order.  

 

Grid View

The Grid View in the General tab allows you to view your current sales account and its child accounts, as well as the associated billing accounts.

 

• The first card displayed will always be your current sales account.
• Additionally, the child accounts and billing accounts have distinct appearances, making it easy for users to distinguish between them.
• If you click the name of the child account, you will be navigated to the lifecycle of the child account.

 

Users can also see the orders and subscriptions associated with the current account and its billing accounts.

 

List View

The list view presents a structured table containing all relevant account details, including the information of the current account, its children sales account, and their associated billing accounts.  

Summary View

The summary view presents a comprehensive view of the current account, its children accounts, and related billing accounts.  The view includes the follow components: 

Account Card

The account card that shows the account image, as well as a list of configurable account fields.  The following 3 fields are displayed dynamically if the current account has children sales accounts: 

• Today's Rollup ARR
  • Indicates Today's ARR rollup from all children sales accounts in the sales account hierarchy.
• Today's Rollup CMRR
  • Indicates Today's CMRR rollup from all children sales accounts in the sales account hierarchy.  
• Rollup TCV
  • Indicates the total TCV rollup from all children sales accounts in the sales account hierarhcy.

Account Revenue Stream

The focal point is a "Revenue Stream" chart presenting account-level revenue streams sourced from subscriptions aggregated across all child sales accounts.

 

By default, this chart illustrates the combined revenue stream generated by all subscriptions across child accounts. Upon toggling the "Show Subscription" switch, it conveniently disaggregates revenue streams for individual subscriptions, consolidated at the product level. For instance, if multiple child accounts hold subscriptions for "Conversational Intelligence," the chart displays the total revenue streams for this product.

 

To enhance visualization, only the top 3 active product subscriptions are listed, with additional products grouped under the "Other" category.

 

Furthermore, users can utilize the "Sales Accounts" dropdown to switch between various sales accounts. By toggling between "Sales Accounts" and "Subscriptions," users can dynamically analyze the revenue stream by both sales accounts and products.

Related Accounts

Within the Related Accounts component, there are 2 tabs: Children Accounts and Billing Accounts.

 

The Children Accounts tab showcases all child accounts of the current account in a hierarchical structure, expanded by default.

 

The Billing Accounts tab shows all billing accounts linked to the current account. For instance, "Walt Disney Corporation" serves as a billing account referencing Disney as its sales account. Disney, in turn, holds a descendant account named "Disneyland Paris." Another billing account, "Theme Park Partner," refers to "Disneyland Paris" as its sales account. In this scenario, both "Walt Disney Corporation" and "Disneyland Paris" will be visible on the Billing Accounts tab.

 

On both tabs, users can click on the "Eye" icon in each row to navigate to the General view of the Lifecycle Manager corresponding to the respective account.

Explore transactions and associated objects of related accounts

Users have the option to inspect orders, subscriptions, assets, entitlements, invoices, credit memos, and more pertaining to related sales accounts within their respective tabs in the Lifecycle Manager.

 

If the current account functions as a sales account, users gain visibility into orders, subscriptions, assets, entitlements, invoices, credit memos, and related data not only for the current account but also for all its associated child sales accounts.

 

In cases where the current account operates as a billing account, users can access orders, subscriptions, assets, entitlements, invoices, credit memos, and pertinent information not only for the current account itself but also for the sales accounts that designate it as the billing account for transaction invoicing.