Opening a utility account, and starting, stopping and moving service

Service Accounts: Open account with a new customer, Start service at a premise, Stop service (move out) with the final bill, Transfer service (move in) and Close account; Service Agreements and changing a rate plan.

Opening an account

1. Open CRM › Utilities › Service Accounts.
2. For somebody new press Open account with a new customer: Customer name, Class (residential, commercial, industrial, municipal or institutional), Email, Telephone, Mailing address, City, State / region, Postal code, Billing cycle, Paperless billing and Life support / critical care. The CRM customer and the utility account are made together.
3. For a customer CRM already knows, press New and choose the Customer instead.
4. Save. The account number is given by the system.

On the account you can also set the Language bills and emails use (two letters, e.g. en, es, ar), a Mailing address (blank: bills go to the service address), Hold collections until a date, and notes. The list shows the Balance, the Deposit and the Credit the utility holds, and whether the account is Paperless, on Autopay or flagged Life support.

Start service

1. On the account’s row choose Start service.
2. Choose the Premise, the Service and the Rate plan; the Meter (blank for an unmetered service such as refuse); the Start read and the Start date.
3. Leave Start read blank if nobody has read the meter: a start service order goes to the field for the read.
4. Save. A service agreement — account × premise × service × rate plan — begins on that date.

Stop service (move out)

1. Choose Stop service (move out) on the account.
2. Enter the Stop date and, for a single metered service, the Final read. Blank: a stop order is sent to read it.
3. When every service on the account has stopped, the final bill is drafted from the day after the last bill to the stop date, and the account becomes final. A deposit is applied to the final bill when it posts.

Transfer service (move in)

Choose Transfer service (move in) on the account that is leaving: choose the New account, the Premise, the Transfer read and the Transfer date. The old account’s service stops on that read and the new account’s starts on the same read, so the use is split exactly. The leaving account gets its final bill.

Close account

Close account is offered on a final account. It is refused unless the account owes nothing and holds nothing — refund or apply a credit balance or deposit first.

Service Agreements

Utilities › Service Agreements lists every agreement with its account, premise, service, rate plan, meter, start, stop, status, connection and Billed through. Agreements are made by Start service and ended by Stop or Transfer; here you may only change the Rate plan (and notes). The next bill rates on the new plan.