DBD: Summary Bill

💡 Onboarding Strategy: When first implementing Summary Billing, set Print Invoice for each Shipment? to Y (Yes) for all selected options. This allows your internal accounting team to evaluate the layout and accuracy of the Summary Bill before officially cutting off standard invoicing. Everything will appear identical to your customer during this evaluation phase.

Customer Setup & Parameter Mapping

To activate summary billing, you must first define which order types should bypass standard individual billing and route into the consolidation file.

Accounts Payable → Maintenance → Customer Defaults

1. Select Order Types: Locate the Summary Bill parameters and select the specific transaction types you wish to accumulate:
   • Invoices / Orders (I    )
   • Requisitions (R    )
   • Warehouse Releases (W    )
2. Configure Shipment Document Printing: For each option selected above, toggle the Print Invoice for each Shipment? flag:
   • Leave as Y during your initial testing phase.
   • Toggle to N once you are ready to transition to full paperless summary consolidation.

⚙️ Partial Configuration Tip: You do not have to activate Summary Billing for all transaction types. For example, many companies prefer to enable it strictly for Requisitions (R    ) to aggregate small, frequent warehouse maintenance charges while continuing to send individual standard invoices for major Sales Orders (I    ).

Initializing the File (One-Time Step)

Once your customer defaults are saved, you must ensure you are beginning with a clean slate.

Print Management → Reports → Item Management → Customer Summary Bill (Also accessible via: Order Processing → Reports → Order Reports → Customer Summary Bill)

1. Run the Summary Bill report for the targeted customer.
2. Immediately execute the Clear command. This purges any historical remnant data and ensures the summary file starts completely empty for your active tracking cycle.

Mid-Month Processing Workflows

All invoices entered, processed, and updated after the customer defaults are established will automatically route to the Summary Bill file.

• Daily Billing: Process your daily billing loops as normal.
• Sales Journal Tracking: On your summary sales journal, a short notation will display beneath each transaction indicating it is a Summary Bill Invoice. If you have turned off individual invoice printing (N), it will be designated on the sales journal as a Non-Printing Invoice.
• Open Accounts Receivable: When reviewing the customer’s open invoice file mid-month, individual entries will display with a clean status message: (Summary Bill Pending)    .

Generating & Finalizing the Summary Bill

At the end of the month (or on your prearranged billing schedule), you will generate the consolidated statement and commit the balances to Accounts Receivable.

Step 1: Run the Report

Navigate back to the Customer Summary Bill screen. The statement will generate directly to a PDF and automatically compiles three distinct reporting views:

1. Summary Bill: The core consolidated page tracking the balance due.
2. Detail Shipments by Location: A clean breakdown of individual drop-offs.
3. Cover Sheet: An optional, client-facing routing block.

Step 2: Define Filtering Parameters

• Invoice Date Range: If left blank, the system will pull absolutely every transaction that has accumulated in the file since your last clear cycle.
• Summary Bill Reference: Enter a custom string that signifies the period (e.g., 2026PD05     to represent the 5th period of 2026). When this reference appears on a customer's check stub, your team will instantly recognize it as a consolidated payment. Alternatively, enter AUTO     to have the software assign standard system invoice sequences.
• Due Date Override: If you enter a specific date here, the system will dynamically push this date as the definitive Due Date across all underlying records in your A/R open invoice file, keeping your aging reports completely accurate.

Step 3: Audit and Clear (Critical)

1. Verify the report data against your internal hardcopy invoices or tracking logs to ensure accuracy.
2. Set the Indicate Report Type dropdown field to "Both".
3. Execute the Clear option.

🔴 Critical Data Warning: The Summary Bill report continuously accumulates data. If you fail to clear the report, your next month's statement will accidentally include all of this month's data in addition to the new period's transactions. The Clear option is strictly protected and will only appear on the screen when the Report Type field is actively set to "Both".

Related Cash Receipts Processing

Once a Summary Bill is generated, it must be cleared through the A/R ledger using the system's specialized automated sweep. For step-by-step entry instructions and critical leading-zero formatting rules, see:

• DBD: Cash Receipts 4 - Payment Distribution Methods (Level 3) (Section: Summary Bill Invoice Matching)

Going Live (Paperless Transition)

Once your accounting team is completely comfortable with the data flow and collection layout, navigate back to Customer Defaults and change your Print Invoice for each Shipment? flags from Y to N.

The system will transition to generating "Non-Printing Invoices" on your back-end journals, completely eliminating individual physical invoice clutter while safely maintaining your automated month-end consolidations.