Creating Charges for Accounts - m3ter Documentation

Creating Charges for Accounts

You can create Charges for your end-customer Accounts to serve use cases that require ad-hoc or one-off line items for Account billing. Charges are:

Created for either debit or credit amounts.
Linked to a Product for accounting purposes.
Optionally linked to a Contract.
Given a specific date for billing.
- When a bill job has run for the specified Charge bill date, a Charge appears as an Ad-hoc line item on a Bill.
Assigned a service period.
Available in any currency defined for your Organization.

When you set up a Charge for an Account, a new Bill is created for the specified billing date or, if other billing charge types are due on the Account on that date, can be consolidated with those other charge types in a single Bill. This topic sets out some common use cases where Charges can be used, explains how to create and manage Charges for your end-customer Accounts, and gives some examples of how to view Bills for Account Charges:

Charges: Common Use Cases

The following use cases illustrate where Charges can enhance your revenue operations, providing your business with greater control over billing workflows without modifying core pricing plans:

One-Time Fees and Ad hoc Adjustments

Scenario

A business wants to add manual, one-time fees to customer invoices outside of standard usage-based billing.

How Charges solve this Scenario

Users can create Adhoc Charges that appear as one-time line items on bills. Examples include:

Setup fees for new accounts.
Manual service fees (for example, consulting charges).
Penalty fees for late payments.

Example

A SaaS company charges a one-time custom onboarding fee of $500 when a new customer signs up. Instead of modifying the contract, they create an Adhoc Charge linked to the Onboarding Service product and assign it to the customer’s next bill.

Discounts, Refunds, and Service Credits

Scenario

A business wants to issue discounts, refunds, or credits directly to customer bills without altering contracts or subscription plans.

How Charges solve this Scenario

Negative Charges (credits) can be applied to offset fees.
Discounts can be linked to specific products or contracts for accounting accuracy.
Service credits can be applied to future bills using a scheduled charge.

Example

A telecom provider issues a $50 refund to a customer due to a service outage. Instead of modifying the plan, they create a credit charge for -$50 and link it to the next billing cycle.

Contract-Specific Custom Charges

Scenario

Businesses need to apply charges tied to specific contracts rather than general billing rules.

How Charges solve this Scenario

Charges can be linked to contracts for tracking and auditing.
Ensures alignment with contractual obligations, service levels, or penalties.

Example

A managed services provider includes a clause in a contract for custom engineering support fees at an hourly rate. When support is provided, an Adhoc Charge is created under the contract’s ID and added to the next bill.

Creating and Managing Account Charges

You can create ad-hoc Charges for your end-customer Accounts in m3ter directly from the Account details page. When you’ve created Charges for an Account, from the Charges tab you can review Charge details and edit or delete a Charge:

Note: Balance Charges. You can also create Charges for Account Balances, and these will also be listed on the Account>Charges tab. See Creating Charges for Balances for more details.

Creating a Charge for an Account

To create a Charge for an Account:

Select Accounts. The Accounts page opens.
In the Accounts listing, search for and select the Name text of the Account you want to create a Charge for. The Account details page opens with the Overview tab selected.
On the Account actions menu:

Select Charges>Create charge:Alternatively:

Select the Charges tab.
On the Charges panel, select Create charge.

The Create page opens.

Complete the Charge details:
- Name. Enter a name for the Charge. ( Required)
- Code. Enter a code for the Charge. ( Required)
- Currency. Use the drop-down list to select the currency you want to use for the Charge. ( Required)
- Amount. Enter the Charge amount to be billed. ( Required if Units/Unit price not provided)
- Units and Unit price. Enter if you haven’t entered an Amount. At billing, the Charge amount will be calculated as the number of Units multiplied by the Unit price. ( Required if Amount not provided)
  - Note that you cannot provide both an Amount and Units/Unit price.
- Service period start date (inclusive) and Service period end date (exclusive). Use the calendar pop-ups to define a service period for the charge. ( Required)
- Bill date. Enter the date the Charge will be billed against the Account. ( Optional)
  - You can omit a specific date for billing the Charge in cases where you want to create the Charge against the account but the exact date it will be billed is not yet determined.
Enter optional Charge settings:
- Accounting product. For accounting purposes, select a Product to link the Charge Bill line item to. (Optional)
- Description. Enter a custom description that will appear for the bill line item for the Charge. ( Optional)
  - Note that if you leave this blank, a default description will be used: Ad hoc charge.
- Contract. If you want to add the Charge to a Contract you’ve created for the Account, use the drop-down to select it. For more details on Contracts, see Creating Contracts for Accounts. ( Optional)
- Description. Enter a custom description that will appear for the bill line item for the Charge. ( Optional)
  - Note that if you leave this blank, a default description will be used: Ad hoc charge.
- Notes. Use this to enter any notes for the Charge. These will not appear on any Bills, but can be referred to for audit purposes. ( Optional)

In this example a Charge will be created for a one-off onboarding fee of $500 against a new customer:

A service period of two days - March 14th and 15th - is defined to allow for setting up and testing the new service setup.
The Charge will be billed the day after the two-day service period - March 16th.

Select Create charge. You are returned to the Charges tab where the new Charge is listed:

Viewing Charge Details

To view Charge details:

Select Accounts. The Accounts page opens.
Select the Name text hotlink of the Account with the Charge you want to review. The Account details page opens.
Select the Charges tab.
On the Charges panel, select the Name text hotlink of the Charge you want to review. The Charge details page opens:

Editing and Deleting Charges

To edit or delete a Charge on an Account:

Select Accounts. The Accounts page opens.
Select the Name text hotlink of the Account with the Charge you want to review. The Account details page opens.
Select the Charges tab.
If you want to edit a Charge, on the Charges panel select the edit icon for the Charge:

The Edit page opens.

Make the required editing changes and select Update charge. Your updates are saved and you are returned to the Charges tab.
If you want to delete a Charge, select the Delete icon:

A confirmation popup appears

Select Yes to confirm and complete the deletion.

Note: Deleting Billed Charges? If a Bill for a Charge has already been generated, you won’t be able to delete the Charge and an error message will show. You must first delete any Bills generated for a Charge before attempting to delete it.

Filtering the Charges List

An Account’s Charges tab lists both ad-hoc and Balance Charges. You can filter the Charges list to meet your current requirements. To filter the Charges list on an Account:

Select Accounts. The Accounts page opens.
Select the Name text hotlink of the Account with the Charges you want to filter for review. The Account details page opens.
Select the Charges tab. By default All charges, both ad-hoc and Balance Charges, are listed.
You can filter the list to show only Ad-hoc charges created for the Account:
Alternatively, you can filter the list to show only Balance charges:

Viewing Bills for Account Charges

You can run billing for an Account with an ad-hoc Charge on it and check the billed amount and date. How Bills are generated for Accounts with ad-hoc Charges created for them depends on whether or not you have selected to consolidate Bills for your Organization:

Separate Bills for Charges. If you haven’t selected to consolidate Bills for your Organization, you can run billing for an Account for the ad-hoc Charge bill date and generate a separate Bill for the Charge.
- Note that in this case, even if the Charge bill date coincides with a regular billing date set up for the Account - such as the first of a month for an Account on a monthly billing frequency with billing dates of the first day of month - the Charge will not appear on the regular monthly Bill covering other charge types due against the Account, such as usage charges, and a separate Bill is generated.
Consolidated Bills for Charges. If you have selected to consolidate Bills for your Organization and the ad-hoc Charge bill date coincides with a regular bill date set up for the Account, then the Charge will appear on the regular monthly Bill covering other charge types due against the Account, such as usage charges.
- Note that in this case, if the Charge bill date doesn’t coincide with one of the Account’s regular billing dates, you can generate a separate bill for the Charge by running billing for the specific Charge bill date.

This section gives examples to show how to generate Bills for Account with ad-hoc Charges:

Viewing Separate Bills for Ad-Hoc Charges

To view separate Bills for ad-hoc Charges:

Select Accounts. The Accounts page opens.
Select the Name text hotlink of the Account with the ad-hoc Charge for which you want to view Bill. The Account details page opens.
Select the Bills tab.
On the Bills panel, select Run billing. The Run billing modal opens.
On the Run billing modal:
- For Invoice date, select the Bill date defined for the ad-hoc Charge.
- For Bill frequency, select Ad hoc.
- For Target currency, select the Currency configured for the ad-hoc charge:
Select Run billing. The Bill for the ad-hoc Charge is generated and is listed on the Bills tab:
Select the Reference text hotlink for the Bill. The Bill opens in Bill management.
Under Display options, select to Group by accounting product:

The Bill adjusts: In this example, we’ve run billing for the ad-hoc Charge example created for an Account in the previous section in the amount of $500, which had a Bill date of March 16th 2025. When the Bill is opened:

The line item Type is shown as Ad-hoc.
Because we set up the Charge as an Amount, the line item shows No. of units = 1 and a Unit price in the Amount specified.
A text hotlink allows you to open the Charge details page directly from the Bill.

Suppose now that other ad-hoc Charges had been created for the same Account with the same Bill date. For example, the new customer was eligible for a discount against the normal onboarding fee for taking early sign-on. A negative ad-hoc Charge could be created for the Account and for the same Accounting product to cover this kind of case:

If we now go back to the Bills tab and re-run billing for Ad-hoc Charges on the same Account for March 16th Invoice date and open the recalculated Bill, then the new ad-hoc negative discount Charge is shown:

Note: Charges for Balances? You can also create Charges for Balances on an Account. If you’ve done this and the Balance Charge bill date is the same as the Account Charge bill date and you run billing on the Account for the joint bill date for Ad-hoc frequency, then the Balance fee line item for the Balance Charge will also appear on the Bill. See Running and Viewing Bills for Balance Charges.

Viewing Consolidated Bills for Ad-Hoc Charges

In the following example, we have an Account set up for monthly billing frequency and the billing cycle date for the first and subsequent billing as March 1st 2025.

Important: Switch on Consolidated Bills for Organization! If you want to show ad-hoc Charges line items on the same Bills as other line item types - such as usage charges set up to be billed at monthly frequencies - you must switch on the Consolidate bills setting on in your Organization configuration. This will ensure different billing frequencies are consolidated into the same Bill. See Viewing and Editing Organization Configuration for more details.

To view consolidated Bills for ad-hoc Charges:

Select Accounts. The Accounts page opens.
Select the Name text hotlink of the Account with the ad-hoc Charge for which you want to view a consolidated Bill. The Account details page opens.
Select the Bills tab.
On the Bills panel, select Run billing. The Run billing modal opens.
On the Run billing modal:
- For Invoice date, select the regular billing date which the ad-hoc Charge bill date coincides with - for the current example, March 1st 2025.
- For Target currency, select the Currency configured for the ad-hoc charge:

Note that because Consolidating bills is enabled, charges for all billing frequencies will be shown on the generated Bill and there is no option to select a Bill frequency on the Run billing modal.

Select Run billing. The Bill for the selected date is generated and listed on the Bills panel:

In this example of a consolidated Bill:

The ad-hoc Charge line item is shown under the Onboarding Service Product.
Usage charges that have accrued since the new end-customer Account was onboarded mid-month are shown under the Premium Data Store product.