VTERM HELP MENU

Created by Drew Star

View Clients     Allows you to see your current billing database clients.  You can edit, delete, or bill individual records by using the PROCESS buttons.  Note that entries highlighted in YELLOW are ready for billing.  These accounts have been active for longer than their normal billing cycle (CYCLE > REBILL).  Accounts highlighted in RED have experienced problems with billing (card bounced, bad expiration date, card rejected, etc).  If you click on EDIT you can find out the specific problem with the account and correct it by switching the STATUS drop down menu to CLEAR STATUS.

DIFFERENT HIGHLIGHT COLORS MEAN DIFFERENT THINGS

HIGHLIGHTED YELLOW = CLIENT SCHEDULED TO BE BILLED

NO HIGHLIGHT = CLIENT NOT DUE FOR BILLING

HIGHLIGHTED RED = THERE IS A PROBLEM WITH THIS CLIENTS BILLING INFORMATION

Download      Dumps the current billing database to your browser as a flat file database.  You can then save the updated database to your desktop for future use.    Make sure that you DO NOT DIRECTLY SAVE the browser output from the DOWNLOAD feature.  CLICK DOWNLOAD, then VIEW SOURCE, then save the text file that your browser opens up.  Save as a txt file and not html.

Add Client     Allows you to manually add a new client to your billing database.

Edit    The edit radio box causes the process button for that client to pull up an edit form.  You can make changes to the individual client records and make them permanent by clicking on the submit button inside the edit menu.  It will also bring up any BILLING ERRORS previously experienced with the account being edited which can be corrected by the STATUS pull down menu by selecting "CLEAR STATUS".

Delete    The delete radio box causes the corresponding process button to delete the record from your billing database.  This is not reversible.  To delete ALL of the accounts and start over simply quit your browser.

Bill    The BILL radio box when checked causes the corresponding process button for that client to bill their credit card through your authorize.net account.  The billing will only occur when the billing CYCLE exceeds the REBILL time.  CYCLE is the number of days since the last billing occurred.  REBILL is the number of days between billing cycles.  Thus if CYCLE > REBILL the account will be highlighted in yellow unless there was a previous billing failure and it will be highlighted in red.  If you wish to alter the billing CYCLE use the edit menu to bump up the CYCLE value.  Also note that when you bill a client the CYCLE value will be reset to zero.  The CYCLE value will increment by 1 each day thereafter.  Accounts that are not highlighted in YELLOW (eg white or red) cannot be billed.

Notify    Clicking on the notify button will email billing messages to all the clients with bad billing data informing them that they need to submit corrected billing information.  It will send the error message contained in the $RESPONSE field so your clients will know what they need to do to correct their billing information.

If you want to start over     If, for whatever reason, you want to completely start over and clear out all the data simply quit your browser.  This will dump all of the information out of your browser.

Help     This pulls up the help menu.

Upload    Click on the BROWSE button to locate your flatfile billing database.  The database must be created in a field delimited, flat file format using the PIPE | character to separate fields.  The fields must be arranged EXACTLY in the following order:

$NAME|$ADDRESS|$CITY|$STATE|$ZIP|$COUNTRY|$PHONE|$EMAIL|$ACCTNO|$ABACODE|$BANKNAME|$CARDNUM|$EXPDATE|$AMOUNT|$REBILL|$CYCLE|$METHOD|$STATUS|$RESPONSE

Each field is described below

FIELD	Description
$NAME	The cardholders name (first and last)
$ADDRESS	Billing address
$CITY	Billing city
$STATE	billing state
$ZIP	billing zipcode
$COUNTRY	billing country (optional)
$PHONE	billing phone number
$EMAIL	billing email address
$ACCTNO	checking account number (if billing by check)
$ABACODE	checking routing number (if billing by check)
$BANKNAME	checking bank name (if billing by check)
$CARDNUM	credit card number (if billing by credit card)
$EXPDATE	expiration date (if billing by credit card)  format is monthyear (eg:  0202)
$AMOUNT	amount to bill.  must be followed by 2 decimal places.  eg:  10.00
$REBILL	days between billing periods.  eg:  30 for every 30 days
$CYCLE	days since last billing.  when this value exceeds the REBILL value billing may occur
$METHOD	method of billing.  values must equal one of the following:  ACH (for checking), Visa, MasterCard, Discover,Amex, Diners Club, JCB.  This field is case sensitive.
$STATUS	values equal passed, failed or testing.  If the last billing attempt failed this will cause the entry to be highlighted in red.  This value can be re-initialized in the edit menu.  This field value is generated by the billing software.
$RESPONSE	this field contains error messages returned by authorize.net.  The problem must be corrected in the edit menu in order to bill successfully.