Contracts Contribute to the Membership

As described in how are service credits earned, many memberships are related to specific contracts for the membership's accounts. We refer to these contracts as the contracts that contribute to the membership because often the service credit amounts earned for the membership are based on amounts spent by the customer for these services.

During the lifetime of a membership, contracts that contribute to a membership may be stopped and other contracts started. For example, perhaps you have a frequent flier membership that is related to financial service. Imagine that the customer starts out with a certain rate for financial service, but later decides to opt for a different type of rate that requires expiring the old contract and creating a new one. How does this affect your frequent flier mile calculation? It depends on how you design the algorithm that creates the frequent flier events. Essentially, the algorithm must cater for this situation. The following diagram illustrates the scenario.

The contracts that contribute to a membership are not linked directly to the membership record. This would cause a maintenance burden, requiring links to be updated when service is stopped or started for applicable contracts. Rather, this link is indirect. The list of contract types is defined for the membership type. The system can determine which contracts are "linked" to the membership by looking at the contract types for the membership type.