11. Billing rules

A billing rule describes one charge: what it is called, which flats pay it, how much, when it is billed, when it falls due, and what happens if it is paid late. Bills are produced from the rules. Each rule produces its own invoice for each flat it covers, so a flat covered by a Maintenance rule and a Sinking Fund rule receives two invoices for the period.

Before you start you need the fee type (chapter 10), a revenue account in the Ledger for the income (chapter 8), and your towers, floors and flats in place (chapter 4).

1. Open Billing Rules in the sidebar and click Add Billing Rule .
2. Under Fee Head & Scope, choose the Fee type and the Target account, then narrow the scope if the rule is not for every flat.
3. Under Billing Cycle & Validity, choose the Billing frequency, the Billing day, the Bill due days and the Effective from date.
4. Under Calculation & Tax (GST), choose the Calculation basis and enter the amount or rate. Tick Apply GST (Goods & Services Tax) if the charge is taxed.
5. Under Late Penalty Policy, choose the Penalty type, or leave it at No Penalty.
6. Click Create Rule .

The form shows only the fields that apply: the amount or the rate according to the basis, the GST fields once GST is ticked, the penalty fields once a penalty type is chosen.

A rule applies to a flat when all three scope fields match it. A blank field matches everything.

• Choose the tower before the floor. The floor list fills in once a tower is chosen.
• Inactive flats are never billed. Vacant flats that are active are billed like any other.
• Rules do not replace one another. If a society-wide Maintenance rule and a 3 BHK Maintenance rule are both active, a 3 BHK flat gets a bill from each. To charge flat types differently, create one rule per flat type and no society-wide rule for that charge.

• Amounts are rounded to two decimal places, with half a paisa rounded up.
• A Per Sq.Ft. rule needs the flat's area. A flat with no area is skipped for that rule. Enter the area on the flat (chapter 4).

• Billing day. Early in the morning of this day of the month, bills are generated for the current month without anyone clicking anything (chapter 12). The day stops at 28 so that it exists in every month.
• Due date. The billing period start date plus the Bill due days. Bills are for the period starting on the 1st, so with 15 due days the August bill is due on 16 August, whichever day it was generated.
• Effective from and Effective to. The rule is used when the billing period start date falls on or between these dates. A rule effective from 10 August is not used for the period starting 1 August; it starts with September. Effective to cannot be earlier than Effective from.

A penalty starts on the first day after the due date and is recalculated every night while the bill stays unpaid.

• Periods. With Recurring Penalty unticked there is one period: the penalty is charged once, on the first overdue day, and does not grow. With it ticked, periods = 1 + (days overdue ÷ recurrence days, rounded down).
• Bill line total is the charge including its GST.
• Part payments do not reduce the base. Interest is worked out on the full line total, not on the balance left.
• GST on the penalty. If Also apply GST on late penalties is ticked, GST at the rule's rate is added to the penalty.

Worked example. A bill of ₹2,500.00 was due on 15 August. The rule's recurrence is 30 days. On 20 September the bill is 36 days overdue, so periods = 1 + (36 ÷ 30, rounded down) = 2.

From day 1 to day 29 overdue there is one period; from day 30 there are two; from day 60, three.

• GST is decided rule by rule. There is no society-wide rate and no threshold amount. A rule with Apply GST ticked adds its own percentage to every bill it produces; a rule without it adds nothing.
• Because each rule produces its own invoice, a flat can receive a taxed invoice and an untaxed one for the same month.
• GST = charge × rate%, rounded to two decimals. ₹2,500.00 at 18% gives ₹450.00 GST and a bill of ₹2,950.00.
• The GST collected is credited to GST Output Tax Payable in the ledger, not to the rule's income account.
• Whether your society must charge GST, and at what rate, is a question for your auditor. The system applies what you enter.

The Billing Rules list shows each rule's fee type, scope, flat type, rate or amount, frequency and status. Click a row, or View Details in its menu, to see the whole rule.

• Tick several rows to archive, activate or deactivate them together from the bar at the bottom.
• Invoices already issued are not touched by deactivating or archiving a rule.
• Delete permanently is offered on archived rules. Use it only for a rule created by mistake.

• The Fee type or Billing frequency list is empty: none is active. Add or activate one under Settings.
• The Target account list is empty: there is no active Revenue account. Add one in the Ledger.
• "Select a tower before selecting a floor": a floor scope needs its tower.
• "Flat amount is required" or "Rate per sq.ft. is required": fill the field that matches the Calculation basis.
• A flat was not billed: check that the rule is active and not archived, that the billing period start date falls within its effective dates, that the flat is active and matches the scope, and for a Per Sq.Ft. rule that the flat has an area.
• A flat was billed twice for the same charge: two active rules with the same fee type both cover it. Narrow the scope of one, or deactivate it.