Understanding Consumer Contracts

Consumer contracts record customer relationships. These relationships can encompass multiple services, multiple sites and multiple accounts. For example a consumer contract can be for a customer's gas and electricity supply at a single site or for a customer’s water supply at multiple sites.

A consumer contract can relate to one or more consumer product versions. A consumer product version records values that are common to all consumer contracts related to that consumer product version. A consumer product version also records rules that are applied by customer service requests to set up a new consumer contract or change an existing consumer contract. These rules can for example create service agreements or stop service agreements. Refer to Understanding Consumer Products for more details. A consumer contract’s consumer contract products record the links between the consumer contract and consumer product versions.

Note a consumer contract relates to consumer product versions not to consumer products. The consumer product version linked to a consumer contract is the version of the required consumer product that is applicable for that consumer contract. This could for example be the consumer product version that is effective for the date the consumer contract was agreed.

Consumer contracts group together service agreements. The relationship between a consumer contract and a service agreement is recorded in the service agreement by linking the service agreement to one of the contract’s consumer contract products. A consumer contract can record details that are common for all of the related service agreements.

All consumer contracts have a consumer contract type. A consumer contract type limits which consumer products are valid for a consumer contract of that type. Note the consumer products that are eligible are further limited by the consumer product's eligibility criteria. Refer to Understanding Consumer Products for more details.

A consumer contract can have milestones where a milestone is a date that is significant to the contract. Milestones can optional trigger an action. Refer to Understanding Consumer Contract Milestones for more details.