Overriding Rate Terms

If your organization has business rules that require a service agreement's rate terms to be overridden, you can accomplish this using umbrella agreements and terms of service records. There are two levels of overriding that are possible:

  • Override rate schedule
  • Override other terms on the rate, including contract riders, contract terms and tax exemptions

To override any rate terms, the service agreement must be linked to a terms of service record that references a template service agreement. In addition, you must configure settings in the system to indicate whether or not overriding of terms is allowed.

  • The SA type for the customer's service agreement indicates whether or not the rate schedule may be overridden using the rate source flag.
    • If the rate source value is Check TOS First, then SA, when applying the rate, the system determines if the SA is linked to a TOS effective at the time of the bill with a template SA. If so, the rate schedule on the template SA is used.
    • If the rate source value is Check SA Only, when applying the rate, the always uses the rate schedule on the customer's SA (regardless of whether or not the SA is linked to a TOS effective at the time of the bill with a template SA).
  • If any bill factor on one of calculation rule indicates that it is eligible for tax exemptions, contract terms or contract riders, the terms of service usage flag on the bill factor indicates where the system should look for the appropriate value. The flag tells the system to find applicable information either on the TOS's template SA only, on the customer's SA only or it should first check the TOS, then check the customer's SA.

The following table illustrates the different scenarios possible when configuring your bill factors and the resulting behavior. The term "standard behavior" in the tables below indicate that the standard behavior as described in Defining Bill Factors is followed.

TOS Usage

Template SA

Customer SA

BF Char Source

Contract Rider Applicability is checked

Check TOS First, then SA

Found

Not checked

If source = SA, the template SA's characteristic collection is checked. If source <> SA, the standard behavior is followed.

Not Found

Found

If source = SA, the customer SA's characteristic collection is checked. If source <> SA, the standard behavior is followed

Not Found

Not Found

N/A

Check TOS Only

Found

Not checked

If source = SA, the template SA's characteristic collection is checked. If source <> SA, the standard behavior is followed

Not Found

Not checked

N/A

Check SA Only

Not checked

Standard behavior

TOS Usage

Template SA

Customer SA

BF Value Source

BF Char Source

Value in Contract Term is checked

Check TOS First, then SA

Found

Not checked

Template SA

N/A

Not Found

Found

Customer SA

N/A

Not Found

Not Found

Bill Factor Value (based on Char Source)

If source = SA, the template SA's characteristic collection is checked. If source <> SA, the standard behavior is followed

Check TOS Only

Found

Not checked

Template SA

N/A

Not Found

Not checked

Bill Factor Value (based on Char Source)

If source = SA, the template SA's characteristic collection is checked. If source <> SA, the standard behavior is followed

Check SA Only

Not checked

Standard behavior

TOS Usage

Template SA

Customer SA

BF Value Source

Tax Exemption is checked

Check TOS First, then SA

Found

Not checked

Template SA

Not Found

Found

Customer SA

Not Found

Not Found

No value

Check TOS Only

Found

Not checked

Template SA

Not Found

Not checked

No value

Check SA Only

Not checked

Standard behavior

Note that proration logic is followed for the above functionality as expected. For example, imagine that a bill factor with Value in Contract Terms is proratable and the TOS usage value is Check TOS First, then SA. If the template SA has a contract value that is only in effect for the first 10 days of a bill, that value is used for the first 10 days and the remaining days in the bill take the value from the SA (if applicable) or the bill factor value as per the table rules above.

Note:

When designing your terms of service type, you must indicate whether a template service agreement is optional, required or not allowed. When the template SA is required, the user setting up the TOS record for this TOS type must link the correct service agreement as the template SA. If a new template service agreement is required, the new SA must be created first.