charges as billable --

[raymond]

we REALLY need a way to modify CommitCRM so that all charges under all contracts (including System - Global System Contract) default to not billable (unchecked).

The workflow that we have created is that a tech performs work, enters charges (they MUST remember to uncheck billable) then when the ticket is complete and ready for approval by the account manager, flags the ticket as "Comp-Pend Approval" (this is a renamed status item). The manager then reviews the ticket to make sure everything looks good, that the problem has been resolved and that all charges add up properly. At that point, the manager marks all items as billable and closes the ticket. The bookkeeper simply "creates invoices" based on whether or not items have been marked as billable... when a tech forgets to uncheck an item as billable, it automatically get's sent to the bookkeeper for billing... this not only gets messy but can create serious confusion at the client level.

There should be a global option (or at the very least, a way to modify contract types including the system contracts) to auto mark charges as unbillable.

thanks!!

//ray

[Support Team]

Re: charges as billable --

Thanks Ray.

The default Billable/Not-Billable flag settings are built into the Contract types. This is done on purpose as the system has its logic. And, like you're already doing, you can change this flag manually when entering Charges. I do not see that we will be changing this anytime soon. I can say that we do have some requests to add some flexibility specifically the ability to tell whether labor/expenses/parts should default to Billable/Not-Billable, once this is implemented you may be able to use it.

With the next release of RangerMSP (5.6) we will support the ability to only list Charge records (while in the QuickBooks wizard) that are related to Completed Tickets.
So you will be able to slightly change your work flow -
Technicians ignore the billable flag and keep it with its default.
The Ticket status is changed 'Comp-Pend Approval'
The Account manage approves it and change to Ticket status to Completed.
Your bookkeeper will only be invoicing Completed Tickets and there won't be a chance that other Billable Charges (that are related to Open Tickets) will be included.

Hope this helps.
Sheli

[raymond]

Re: charges as billable --

That won't work because tickets contain things that need to be billed immdiately (e.g. product) which the manager has approved even though the ticket is still in a working state. This also applies to labor in certain tickets that never actually get closed/completed (or are not closed/completed for long periods of time). Seems to me that marking items as billable is a logical way to send it to the bookkeeper for billing.

I understand that the option is set at the contract level which is fine – we just need a way to set contracts (including the default System – Global contract) to default as non-billable (or billable!) as we see fit. It seems that it would be a pretty trivial thing to add a setting that would allow us to set this.

We are anticipating a large growth spurt in the next 6 months which will change what we can and what we can not gloss over... there are a number of items in CommitCRM that we have "worked around" for the last 4.5 years, this being one of them. Some of the others are not being able to truly use Status as a workflow; not having a true inventory module; the craziness of the $ markup field not working on a per-item basis; better search across accounts, charges and notes; not being able to have required fields in tickets/charges; etc.. Understand that we DO like the CommitCRM product, the CommitCRM team is great and we hope to continue using it as our CRM system but the truth is that we will be forced to look at alternative solutions if we continue to deal with work arounds and can't get the product to support our workflow processes. I just want this product to continue to succeed and be able to support larger shops. Thanks!!!

//ray

[Support Team]

Re: charges as billable --

Thanks for your feedback. I see what you mean with your clarification re the Billable flag for pre-approved items. I'm sure that the coming enhancements, ones that will be introduced in several different version releases during the next 12 months will provide you with most answers. For what is worth, RangerMSP is being used by many larger business with high growth businesses and numerous transactions, including ones with 30-50 technicians (and sometimes much more).

Hope this helps and keep on providing your great feedback.
Sheli

[lpopejoy]

Re: charges as billable --

The inventory module too?

[Support Team]

Re: charges as billable --

I guess you never miss an opportunity :-)

Well, I can't comment on this one. We have some requests for this but it's a large project where we believe that other items have a higher priority as they are more popular. So probably not in the next two releases, maybe at a later stage.

Thanks for asking.
Sheli

[raymond]

Re: charges as billable --

I would say while important, an inventory module is lower priority as we (specifically) have come up with work around (which is very kludge!) -- I have no idea how system builders make it happen though... (!)

thanks for listening... really hope to see a way for us to toggle the default billing setting on contracts (including system) as this is going to become a big issue for us soon enough (I know a number of years ago there was talk about being able to create custom contracts but guessing that was trumped by other important improvements... like all the great stuff on the email connector!).

thanks again!

//ray

[lpopejoy]

Re: charges as billable --

It's called accountability. :)

Inventory is medium on my list, but not critical. I'm working on hacking together an Access Database that uses ODBC to reference CommitCRM so that I can show inventory levels. Probably overkill for the small inventory that we have, but it would really be nice.