Invoices are usually triggered automatically by Zero Friciton on condition that all necessary data is available. Usually this implies that meter readings have to be available for the start and end date of the invoicing period (to be able to calculate the real consumption) and that the tariffs and prices for that period are configured. Upon arriving on the final date of the invoicing period (this can be monthly, quarterly, half-yearly or yearly, as defined on that contract) the invoice will be ready for approval.

When the system failed to automatically create the invoices because of missing data (e.g. no meter readings, missing prices/tariffs...), a manual intervention is needed to be able to create that invoice. The missing data has to be added and the creation of the invoice has to be triggered manually. Also, when a user has corrected an invoice because wrong prices or wrong meter readings were used, he has to delete the invoice that was automatically generated by the system. In this case he also has to manually trigger the creation of the (corrected) invoice.

Invoices are usually created upon arriving at the end date of that invoicing period (given that all necessary data is available).

In some cases it happens that you want to bill the invoice in advance. For example the invoice has only fixed costs as a billing item and you want to charge the end user upfront. In that case you have to manually push the Zero Friction software to create te invoices in advance as the end date of the invoicing period has not yet been reached.

All type of invoicing documents (advances, invoices, end notes, creditnotes, incidentel notes) can have different statuses, depending on where they are in the process in our Zero Friction software.

First the document is created and gets a created status. A PDF file will be created that can be reviewed by the user to see if all is correct. (e.g. correct amount, correct layout, correct invoicing items...) At this stage it is easy to delete the invoicing document and recreate a new one with the correct information. There are no accounting implications at this stage. When the created document is correct, it should be approved by the user manually.

Approving the invoicing document means that it gets an official invoicing number and its status is set to approved in our software. Ususally when a document is approved, it is also sended out to the end user via e-mail or post.

An invoicing document can arrive in the next stage of the proces. That is when it has been paid or when it has been credited. As such the amount that still needs to be paid is changed to zero on the customer's balance. The document itself remains unchanged off course, but there is no longer a billing amount to be paid for by the contractor. In this case the document gets the status settled.

Technically before a document is created by the software (and before the PDF file is created), it gets the status generated. The software is in the process of building the document and looks for the necessary template to apply and the underlying billing items to put on the document. The generated state is a temporary state that quickly changes to the created state (see above).

When something goes wrong, and for some reason the PDF file cannot be created, the invoice will get the status generation failed. Remaining in this status usually means something is wrong with the templates that are used for creating that type of invoicing document. Sometimes there is a translation missing or a setting in the templates that generated an error. The user then has to check the template and correct it and then will be able to 'regenerate' the invoicing document so it gets the status created.