Billing Schedules
Overview
Billing Schedules are used to generate and process invoices for items such as school fees, consumables, resources etc. This is where you will set up all of your school fees before the start of the school year. You will also check in here when new students start at your school, or if students change subjects part way through the year.
This area also has some reports available within each Billing Schedule to assist with reporting to school council and reconciliation.
Permissions
Staff who require access to view/edit/create Billing Schedules will need to have the applicable permission.
| Billing.Admin | Allows the user to manage the Compass Billing management module. |
| Billing.Base | Gives the user access to the Billing page and lets you view the dashboard & logs tabs as well as viewing the billing schedule itself. |
| Billing.Configure | Allows users to access the Item Templates tab and perform all actions inside. |
| Billing.Create | Users with this permission have the ability to create ad-hoc transactions, receipting, creation of billing schedules, modification of billing schedules that you've created, duplicate billing schedules. It also gives the ability to Post Charges from Events. |
| Billing.Modifyall | Provides the ability for the user to modify billing schedules they have not created. |
For details on assigning permissions in Compass, please refer to the 'Permissions' article from our Knowledge Base.
Tools Menu
The Tools dropdown menu in the Billing Schedules tab allows you to manage multiple Schedules at a time.
| Find and Raise | Find and Raise is not currently available to most Victorian schools. |
| Create Subject Schedules | This is useful if you manage your Subjects and Classes entirely within Compass. Use this to create Billing Schedules based on your Subjects, and Enrolments will populate based on students enrolled in classes within those. |
| Post Bulk Charges | Allows you to post multiple Schedules’ fees at once. |
| SMS Debtors with Outstanding Payment | Allows you to follow up with parents by SMS using our Bulk SMS module. You can select all parents or individual parents. You will be able to edit the SMS that is sent out before sending. |
| Email Debtors with Outstanding Payment | Allows you to follow up with parents by email. You can select all parents or individual parents. You will be able to edit the email that is sent out before sending. |
| Import Subject Selection CSV | This is useful if you manage your timetabling in a third party software like Edval or Timetabler, and you have a CSV file which matches student codes and subject selections. See the section below ‘Import Subject Selections into Billing’ for more information. |
Viewing Billing Schedules
To view existing Billing Schedules, click the title.
In the Schedule you will see two tabs, 'Billing Items' and 'Enrolments'.
Billing Items
On the 'Billing Items' tab you will see an items included in the Billing Schedule. You will see any related discounts for the item, it's due date and also the amount for the item.
Clicking "Selected" will give you the option to archive selected Billing Items in the Schedule. You can use this prior to Posting fees if you have added a Billing Item that is no longer needed. You will not be able to archive Billing Items after Posting fees.
"Billing Schedule Settings" includes the Title, Description, and Billing Run you entered when creating the Schedule. You will be able to edit the Title and Description up until the first time you Post fees. If you need to change the Billing Run, you will need to create a new Billing Schedule.
Clicking 'Reports' will give you the option to download reports in relation to the Billing Schedule. These will only generate information prior to fees being posted. The purpose of these is to be able to review the Billing Schedule prior to posting fees to families.
Clicking "Selected" will give you the option to archive selected Billing Items in the Schedule. You can use this prior to Posting fees if you have added a Billing Item that is no longer needed. You will not be able to archive Billing Items after Posting fees.
"Billing Schedule Settings" includes the Title, Description, and Billing Run you entered when creating the Schedule. You will be able to edit the Title and Description up until the first time you Post fees. If you need to change the Billing Run, you will need to create a new Billing Schedule.
Clicking 'Reports' will give you the option to download reports in relation to the Billing Schedule. These will only generate information prior to fees being posted. The purpose of these is to be able to review the Billing Schedule prior to posting fees to families.
| Billing Schedule Report | This downloads a pdf file to your device showing what will be billed by debtor in this Billing Schedule. |
| Billing Items Report | This downloads a .csv file to your device containing the details of Debtor Code, Debtor Title, Student Name, Year Level, Form Group, Billing Item, Amount, Tax Included, Discounted Amount, Discounted Tax Included for each item which will be billed. |
Enrolments
On the 'Enrolment' tab you will see all the students enrolled for that Billing Schedule and a series of columns for each student providing key details.
| Last Modified | Date of the last action in this Billing Schedule for the student |
| Status | Unprocessed - Charges have not yet been posted for this student No Debors - There are no Debtors associated with the student Charges Raised - Items in this Billing Schedule have been posted for this student Error - Indicates that charges have not posted for this student due to an error. Clicking on the 'Error' status will provide further details of what the error relates to. Skipped - Indicates posting charges for this student was skipped and the applicable reason will display when clicked. |
Creating a New Billing Schedule
To create a Billing Schedule, on the 'Billing Schedules' tab, click 'Add Billing Schedule'.
Complete the details required in the pop-up.
| Title | Name the Billing Schedule to clearly define it's purpose. |
| Description | Include any further details required that you need to communication to parents. |
| Billing Run | Select the applicable Billing Run that the Billing Schedule needs to sit within. |
Click 'Save' and the new Billing Schedule will be created and you will see it listed on the 'Billing Schedules' tab. Click the title to open it.
Billing Items Tab
If you need to edit the Billing Schedule information from the "Create Billing Schedule" pop up, you can do so by clicking 'Billing Schedule Settings' within the schedule any time until you Post fees. Once you have posted fees, you will not be able to edit these settings.
Now that you have created the schedule, you can add Billing Items. To do so, click 'Add Billing Items'.
Choose the applicable Template from the drop-down.
This will pre-populate the fields with information from the Item Template. We recommend that you change the Title/Short Description and Long Description to be specific to the item you are raising - such as "Combination Lock", "Year 10 School Camp 2022", or "Curriculum Consumables". Only the Title/Short Description field will be searchable in the Dashboard later.
Set the amount and include any applicable discounts.
If you want the item to be pro-rata for students who enrol later in the year, you will need to set up Pro-rata dates now.
When setting up your Pro-rata dates, you will need to include a start and end date, and then a date per division of the fees.
Example: to set up Pro-rata dates so that fees decrease by 25% each term, you could set them up like this:This would result in the following breakdown of fees:
Keep in mind that the Enrolment Date of the student is the date of their Active Milestone at your school, not their class enrolment date.
Click 'OK' and the item will be added to the schedule.
Continue to add all the items required for this Billing Schedule.
If you need to edit any added items, click the associated pencil icon. You will be able to edit these up until the first time that you Post fees, and then they will be locked for editing.
Enrolments Tab
Next you will need to click to the 'Enrolments' tab. Click 'Add Enrolments' to add students into the schedule.
Add in the applicable students via the available options. You can click 'Advanced' for other options if required (i.e via UserCode etc).
Review the 'Status' for each student and resolve any issues (i.e. for students showing as 'Error', click the error for details). Only students listed as 'Unprocessed' will be able to have the Billing Schedule posted.
Click back to the 'Billing Items' tab. Click 'Post' to issue the charges for the enrolled students.
Please Note: Billing Items and the Billing Schedule cannot be edited after you Post fees for the first time, so please check that this is all correct prior to posting.
Click to the 'Enrolments' tab to review the status for all students, it will show 'Charges Raised' if successful.
Note: If you need to add further students after you have posted the Billing Schedule, you can do so. Add the students to the 'Enrolments' tab and then click back to the 'Billing Items' tab and the 'Post' button will be accessible.
Duplicating a Billing Schedule
If you are setting up multiple Billing Schedules with similar Billing Items, you can use the Duplicate icon to duplicate an already created Billing Schedule.
You will be able to edit the Name and Description of the Schedule, choose whether to copy over the Enrolments, and which Billing Items you want copied.
Click "Duplicate". This will create a new Billing Schedule. You will then be able to edit the individual Billing Items and add new Enrolments before Posting fees.
This can be useful if you want to create a new Billing Schedule for students starting mid year with the same items but different costs (instead of using Pro-rata fees), or if you need to re-post school fees to students who were included in the original Billing Schedule.
Importing Subject Selections into Billing
Billing Management allows you to charge parents specific costs relating to the subjects their student has selected. These are referred to as Per-Subject Charges. This tool is best suited to high schools setting up their next year's school fees at the end of the current year.
For details on this process, please refer to the 'Importing Subject Selections into Billing' article from the Knowledge Base.
Archiving a Billing Schedule
At the end of the school year, or if you make a mistake and want to start fresh while setting up your fees, you may want to archive your old Billing Schedules to tidy up this tab. This will not impact any fees raised through the Billing Schedules you are archiving, but it will mean that the Schedules themselves aren’t visible in the Billing Schedules tab unless you filter for Archived Schedules.
To archive, on the Billing Schedules tab, select the applicable schedule and then click 'Selected' and select 'Archive'.
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