Real-time Billing System

The Real-time Billing System allows for real-time processing (where applicable) with immediate updates. It allows you to perform pre-processing edit checks and troubleshooting to reduce error situations. Invoices generated through Real-Time Billing display the code T in the invoice header, allowing users to easily identify invoices created through the Real-Time Billing process.

Note:  Real-time Billing for Parts is not currently available and should not be considered active.

With the Real-time Billing System you can configure a scheduled billing process for recurring general and rental invoices, for example nightly. Scheduled invoices are processed individually so that if there is an issue for one invoice, the rest can continue to run.

The topics in this section include:

See also:

Security Prerequisites

You can enable real-time billing for a location, or for only a few users at a time, allowing you to control the roll out of this feature in your dealership.

How Location Settings Interact with User Security

Real-time Billing can be controlled at both the location level and the user (security) level.

If Real-time Processing is enabled at the Location level, it applies to all users at that location, regardless of user or user group security settings.

If Real-time Processing is disabled at the Location level, the system will use user or user group security settings to determine access.

Note:  Location-level settings override user-level security when enabled.For Parts, only the location-level setting is currently used.

Enabling a Location

To enable the Real-time General Billing System for all users at a location:

  1. Navigate to Configuration > Miscellaneous > Other > System Settings and click the Location tab.

    The System Settings - Location screen opens.

  2. Scroll down to the Real Time Processing section.

  3. Select the checkbox for the areas you wish to enable, referring to System Settings - Location, Real Time Processing section for details.

  4. Click Save Changes.

Enabling Users

Note:  User-level security settings are only applied when Real-time Processing is disabled at the Location level.If enabled at the Location level, all users automatically use Real-time Billing and individual security switches are ignored.

To enable only specific users at a location:

  1. Navigate to Configuration > Miscellaneous > Other > System Settings and click the Location tab.

  2. Scroll down to the Real Time Processing section and ensure that no checkboxes are selected. Real-time Billing for Parts is not currently available. Location-level settings for Parts exist but are not active for production use.

  3. Click Save Changes.

  4. Navigate to Administration > Settings > Security.

  5. For each user you wish to enable set one or more of these security switches:

    System Security Switch Description
    System 505 - Management Central - Utilities Access to Data Portal Reports Controls access to the output of the billing runs to the Data Portal.
    System 602 - Financial Management - General Ledger Allow Bill Invoice in General Invoicing Activates the real-time General Billing System.
    System 802 - Equipment Invoicing Allow Bill Invoice in Equipment Invoice Activates real-time billing for equipment invoices.
    System 810 - Service Work Order Allow Bill Invoice in Work Order Activates real-time billing for service work orders.
    System 840 - Rental Counter Allow Bill Invoice in Rental Contract Activates real-time billing for rental contracts.
    System 994 - Web Admin Access Batch Jobs

    Gives the user the ability to use the Job Scheduler utility.

  6. Save your changes.

Reports

Real-time Billing reports are posted to the Data Portal, from which you can either run the reports or access the data in Excel format. The raw data is stored in the BILLINGDAT file which can be also accessed via Data Miner or any other reporting tool.

FAQ

As part of our modernization efforts, we listened to many dealer requests for real-time invoice processing. This feature replaces the legacy billing runs using modern Java coding which provides system performance gains, immediate roll-back if a problem is detected, and enhanced support features.

No, it is included in your regular IntelliDealer fees.

The new billing system is real-time. As such, all accounting, inventory, etc. functions that would have happened in the legacy billing run, now occur as soon as the invoice button is clicked.

If there are rental contracts or general invoices with recurring invoices, there are jobs that can be scheduled to process these invoices. This may be daily or whatever schedule is desired. See Billing Schedule.

Note:  While it is possible to schedule the billing process to run multiple times a day, only the first run of the day processes pending invoices. Currently, the only benefit to scheduling the runs more often than once every 24 hours is to pick up changes to the billing schedule which don't have a last run date set yet.

No. One of the key benefits of the new billing system, is that if there is an issue with 1 invoice out of 10, the other 9 will process successfully, and only the one invoice will need to be actioned.

No, it is not mandatory. Real-time Billing can be activated by location settings or security switches, depending on configuration.

If enabled at the location level, it applies to all users. If disabled at the location level, security switches control access by user or user group.

Eventually the legacy billing runs will be sunset.

The switches that activate Real-time Billing are:

  • In 602 - Allow Bill Invoice In General Invoicing

  • In 840 - Allow Bill Invoice In Rental Contract

The data captured by the new billing system is posted to the BILLINGDAT data table. There is a new system feature called the Data Portal which allows the user to print new versions of the reports as well as export the data in an Excel format. See Reports.

No, the new system will immediately return the issue to you to be rectified, then you can simply try again. If there are no validation issues, the invoice will process in real-time.

Yes, the BILLINGLOG data table captures all events including user, invoice, system, dates/times, run name, etc. If an error occurs, click the error link on the Real-time Billing Queue screen to see the error details.

A. In legacy billing, sometimes the customer name in the equipment profile was set to the description entered in the custom accounting for the invoice, but the customer number was correct. This occurred when the account keyed on the custom accounting line was an equipment sale account. In Real-Time Billing, the logic to use the description information was removed. Real-time billing sets the customer name to the Ship To name, if entered, otherwise it uses the customer profile name.

Invoices include a code in the header to indicate their source. A new code T identifies invoices generated through the Real-Time Billing System.

The available invoice source codes are:

O – Online

B – Billing Run

R – Real Time Processing (legacy)

T – Real Time Billing

Security: see Security Prerequisites

Data Source: BILLINGSCH

Revision: 2026.04