Auto Queue Customer Statements

You can use e-automate in conjunction with e-agent to automatically create customer statements and send them to your customers via mail, fax, or e-mail.

In the e-automate customer record, you can flag a customer to send statements, or flag a customer to not receive statements. Ultimately, whether you send a customer a statement or not is up to you, as you can also choose to ignore the customer statement configuration.

Before you can automate the sending of customer statements, certain information must be in place. Each customer to whom you intend to automatically send a customer statement must have a default accounts receivable contact and an invoice method identified in the Customer record. E-automate uses the invoice method identified in the Customer record when sending customer statements and ignores the method identified on the accounts receivable Contact record. When identifying a contact and an invoice method, verify that the method value is displayed adjacent to the Invoice method field. For example, if you selected Fax, e-automate displays the fax number if there is one. If there is not a fax number, e-automate displays a question mark. Method values must be listed with a valid value before automated statements can be sent to the customer.

Once you have identified the contact to whom you are sending statements and the invoice method, you can then use the e-agent task, Auto Queue Customer Statements, to create the customer statements and place them in the document queue. When the statements have been automatically created and placed in the queue, you use a second e-agent task, Auto Send Customer Documents, to print, fax, or e-mail the statements based on the customer invoice method.

How to Enable Customers to Receive Statements in e-automateHow to Enable Customers to Receive Statements in e-automate

From the e-automate Tools menu, select Bulk updates to open the Bulk updates window.

Note: Users must have system rights to perform bulk updates.

Important: Use bulk updates cautiously due to the amount of data that can be updated.

Tip: Best practice recommendation is backing up the database prior to a bulk update, during a time of low e-automate usage.

In the Update list field, use the drop-down menu to select Customers.

To filter the customer list, use the QuickSearch. For more information on using the QuickSearch functionality, see the Using the QuickSearch topic.

Do one or more of the following to select the customers who are to be configured to receive statements:

To select all the customers listed in the display, click the [Check all] button. The system checks the checkbox at the beginning of the row for each customer, indicating all customers listed in the display are to be configured to receive statements.

To unselect all the customers listed in the display, click the [Uncheck all] button. The system unchecks the checkbox at the beginning of the row for each customer, indicating none of the customers listed in the display are to be configured to receive statements.

To manually select customers from the list, check the checkbox at the beginning of the row for each customer who is to be configured to receive statements.

To manually unselect customers from the list, uncheck the checkbox at the beginning of the row for each customer who is not to be configured to receive statements.

In the Update field (lower left), use the drop-down menu to select Send statements.

Check the Send statements checkbox.

Click [Update] to update the Send statement checkbox setting in the Customer record for each customer selected in Step 5. E-automate displays the Confirm window.

To make the changes you identified, click [Yes]; otherwise, click [No] and make necessary adjustments.

If you clicked [Yes] in Step 9, e-automate displays the Completed window, notifying you of the number of records that were updated and asking if you want to refresh the list. Click [Yes] to refresh the list. Click [No] if you do not want the system to refresh the list.

Click [Close] to close the Bulk Updates window.

Identifying a Default AR Contact and Invoice Method in e-automateIdentifying a Default AR Contact and Invoice Method in e-automate

For each customer to whom you want the system to automatically send a customer statement, do the following:

From the e-automate toolbar, click [Customers] to open the Customers list window.

From the customer list, select the customer for which you want to identify a default AR contact and click [Edit].

In the Edit Customer window, click the Contacts tab to bring it forward.

If the contact you want identified as the AR contact is already displayed in the Contacts list, skip to Step 6; otherwise, continue to Step 5.

Enter a new contact by completing the following:

In the Add contact field, use the drop-down menu to select New. E-automate displays the New Contact window.

Complete the following fields as appropriate:

First name: First name of the contact.

Middle name: Middle name or initial of the contact.

Last name: Last name of the contact.

Preferred full name: Full name by which the contact wants to be known.

Preferred first name: First name by which the contact wants to be known.

Phone 1: Contact’s primary phone number.

Phone 2: Contact’s secondary phone number.

Fax: Contact’s fax number.

Email: Contact’s e-mail address.

Web password: Contact's e-info password.

Attention: Name or department to whom correspondence is addressed.

Address: Contact’s street address.

City: City in which the contact’s address is located.

State: State or province in which the contact is located.

Zip: Contact’s postal or zip code.

Country: Country in which the contact is located.

Sales rep: Person within your company responsible for selling to this contact.

In the Preferred Contact Method region, select the method you typically use to communicate with this contact. While e-automate uses the Invoice method specified on the customer record to determine in which format to send invoices and statements, e-automate also requires that you select a preferred method on the contact. Be sure that you have populated a value for the method you intend to use as the invoice method. For example, if you send invoices and statements to the customer via e-mail, be sure to identify an e-mail address on the contact record.

If you want to include meter instructions in the meter requests that are sent automatically, check the Include meter instructions in auto meter requests checkbox.

If you want the equipment location remarks to be included in all communications to this contact, check the Include equipment location remarks in all communications checkbox. The equipment location remarks can be found in the Location remarks field on the Equipment tab of the equipment record.

Click [OK] to save your new contact and return to the Edit customer window.

In the Edit customer window > Contacts tab > Job title field, use the lookup icon to select a job title for this contact.

Note: For more information on creating job titles, see the Creating Job Titles topic.

Click [QuickAdd] to associate this contact with the selected job title with this customer.

In the Accounts receivable contact field, use the lookup icon to select the contact to whom you intend to send invoices and customer statements.

In the Invoice method field, use the drop-down menu to select an invoice method. E-automate uses this method for sending both invoices and customer statements.

Note: If you set Invoice method to Email or Fax, verify that the contact's method-of-contact information displays to the right of the Invoice method field. For example, you should see the accounts receivable contact’s e-mail address or fax number, respectively. If you see ”Missing e-mail address” or "Missing fax number", you need to populate the selected field in the Contact record.

To populate the Phone, Fax, or Email field in this contact's Contact record, do the following:

In the Accounts receivable contact field, use the drop-down menu to select Edit. The Edit Contact window displays.

Note: If you do not have security rights to edit, e-automate displays a warning. You must leave the Customer record, go to the contacts list, locate the contact, edit the contact and make the necessary changes.

Add a value to the appropriate Phone 1, Fax, or Email field.

Click [OK] to return to the Edit Customer window. A verification window displays.

Acknowledge the change by clicking [Yes].

Click [OK] to save the changes to the Customer record.

How to set up the Auto Queue Customer Statements TaskHow to set up the Auto Queue Customer Statements Task

General Task InformationGeneral Task Information

From the e-automate Tools menu, select E-agent to open the E-agent - Tasks window.

From the e-agent toolbar, click [New]. E-agent opens the new task window.

From the list, select Auto queue customer statements.

Click [OK]. E-agent displays the task setup window.

In the Task name field, leave the default name or enter a new name for the task.

Note: All tasks must have a unique name. If you are using multiple tasks for a variety of reasons, each task must have its own, unique name. You can schedule all tasks at different intervals.

In the Task engine field, use the drop-down menu to select the task engine on which you want to run the task.

In the Task user field, use the drop-down menu to select the user under which e-agent is to run this task.

To make this task operational, check the Enabled checkbox.

Options TabOptions Tab

Complete the following fields as appropriate:

Automatically approve: When checked, e-agent submits statements that have been pre-approved for sending to the document queue. If you choose not to pre-approve, an employee must have log into e-automate and approve statements in the document queue before they can be sent.

Minimum balance: When checked, you can identify a minimum cut-off amount for a statement. This feature allows you to not queue statements below your minimum threshold.

Minimum days past due: When checked, you can specify a minimum days past due. For example, you could configure this task to not queue a statement unless the customer has an invoice that is 45 days past due.

Include zero balances: When checked, this task queues statements for customers that have zero account balances.

Include credit balances: When checked, this task includes credit memos in the statements queued.

Include debit balances: When checked, this task includes debit memos in the statements queued.

Queue statements for customers configured to not receive statements: When checked, e-agent creates statements for customers not configured on their customer record to receive statements.

By default all customers are included in the task. To change the customer filter, do the following:

Click the link to the right of Include all customers. The link will be "Include all (no filter)" if no filter is currently being applied or "Filtered" if a filter is currently being applied. When you click the link, the system displays the Customers list window. If no filter is currently being applied, the system displays all the records. If a filter is currently being applied, the system displays the filter criteria and lists the records that meet the filter criteria.

Use the QuickSearch features on this window to add, modify, or clear the filter that determines which customers to include when this e-agent task is processed. For information on using QuickSearch functionality, see the Using the E-agent QuickSearch topic.

When finished adding, modifying, or clearing the filter, click the [OK] button on the Customers list window.

Note: If you added a filter, verify that the system now displays the "Filtered" link to the right of Include all customers. If you cleared the filter, verify that the system now displays the "Include all (no filter)" link to the right of Include all customers.

Schedule TabSchedule Tab

You can choose to schedule the e-agent task so that it runs on an interval and/or you can run the task manually whenever you choose.

To manually run the task, see the "Manually Running Tasks" section of the Task Functionality topic.

To schedule the task to run on a defined schedule, do the following:

Click the Schedule tab to bring it forward.

In the Recurrence pattern region, select Hourly, Daily, Weekly, Monthly, Last day of month, or No recurrence to indicate the frequency with which you want e-agent to process this task.

If you selected Weekly in the previous step, e-agent displays a Run on region with a checkbox for each day of the week. Check the box for each weekday on which you want e-agent to process this task.

In the Start recurrence field, enter (or use the drop-down calendar to select) the date and time you want this schedule to begin.

Note: This field is not available if you set Recurrence pattern to No recurrence.

In the End recurrence region, do one of the following:

Note: The options in this region are not available if you set Recurrence pattern to No recurrence.

To have e-agent process the task indefinitely using the specified Recurrence pattern, select No end date.

To have e-agent process the task only a specified number of times using the specified Recurrence pattern, do the following:

Select End after __ occurrences.

In the End after __ occurrences field, enter the number of occurrences.

To have e-agent process the task through a specified end date and time using the specified Recurrence pattern, do the following:

Select End by __.

In the End by __ field, enter the date and time by which processing of this task is to end.

Completing the TaskCompleting the Task

In the Notification e-mail field, enter the e-mail address(es) of the person or persons the system should notify each time e-agent completes processing of this task. To notify multiple recipients, separate each e-mail address using the delimiter associated with your e-mail program (e.g., janedoe@company.com; johndoe@company.com; joe@company.com where the e-mail program accepts a semicolon as a delimiter).

Click [OK] to save the task settings.