RSMUS.comPrior to 2021, the software industry was already on a steady pace to cloud-based applications, but the past year raised the stakes. A total of 87% of companies said they preferred subscription billing to be part of a suite while only 2% were looking for an array of best-of-breed solutions in a survey from September 2020.
Businesses want more creative pricing, more choices, better analytics, more automation and more focus on design and user experience. Providing all of that requires software companies to have that same sort of powerful software to run their businesses, and NetSuite 2021 Release 2 has them covered. New features and enhancements are designed to help software companies automate their workflows across product lines and business units. It also provides fast- growing software companies more automation of their financial process.
In NetSuite’s 2021.2 release, among many new features and enhancements, NetSuite’s SuiteBilling module/ SuiteApp received a couple of key improvements including a new bulk activation feature.
Subscription Billing Bulk Change Orders:
The new bulk activation feature for NetSuite SuiteBilling automates the activation or suspension of many subscriptions or subscription lines, or simultaneous reactivation or suspension. The result is increased productivity and uniform handling of large numbers of accounts. Now, let’s get into the details!
After your account updates to 2021.2, the SuiteBilling Enhancements SuiteApp is automatically upgraded to the new version one day after your production account is upgraded to 2021.2.
The new Bulk Process Change Order is available if we navigate to Transactions > Subscriptions > Process Bulk Change Orders. Here is what we can do:
- Process Multiple Records for a Bulk Change Order– Search and select multiple subscriptions or subscription lines to include in a bulk change order. For each bulk change order processed, the system generates an audit trail that you can access through the Bulk Operations Summary page.
- Customize Search Filters and Sub list Columns– Use predefined filters to search for records or customize the filters that you want to be available for searching. Available predefined filters include customer, billing account, subscription plan, start date, and end date. You can also customize the columns that you want to show in search results.
- Specify the Status Change and Change Order Details– Apply any of the following status changes to subscriptions or subscription lines:
- Draft to Pending Activation
- Draft to Active
- Pending Activation to Draft
- Pending Activation to Active
- Active to Suspend
- Suspend to Reactivate
For status changes related to activation, suspend, or reactivate change orders, you must specify the details of the change order such as effective date, requester, modification type, and memo. For activation, you can request an off-cycle invoice for advanced charges.
The 2021.2 release also includes enhancements for bulk operations using mass update
- Void Records for Usage–Prior to 2021.2, a Delete Records mass update action was available for deleting erroneous or obsolete usage records. Starting version 21.2, the Delete Records action is changed to Void Records, and the processed records are now voided instead of deleted.
- Void Records for Change Order– Subscription change order records have always been voided instead of deleted when using the Delete Records mass update action. Starting version 21.2, the Delete Records action is renamed to Void Records to accurately reflect what goes on in the system.
Smart Financials and Operational Automation:
At a high level here are the new financial and operation automation features:
- Foreign exchange (FX) rates from HSBC are now integrated into the NetSuite platform, and the API allows for automatically updating FX rates. This ensures users are considering the most current exchange rates in financial statements.
- Payment links can now be added on invoices, taking your customers to an online payment portal where they can pay with credit or debit cards. NetSuite automatically records invoices as paid partially or in full, simplifying and automating cash application.
- By matching imported bank payments with open invoices, additional automated cash application functionality centralizes payment processing, reduces manual tasks, and leads to better insight into cash flow.
- Consolidate purchase requisitions across subsidiaries with a new requisitions and procurement feature. Purchased items are received at the target subsidiary, and cross-subsidiary transactions are automatically cross-charged for better pricing, increased productivity, and minimal overhead.
- Prevent overspending by validating purchase requests, orders, and vendor bills with the new expense commitment standard budget validation feature. The feature also includes translations for all supported languages (27 different languages)
