Use the Live Bills Release option to release and/or cancel the billing for each client/media/ product/estimate/activity month. The Live Bills Release option displays billing activity collected through either an overnight or immediate Pre-Bill Analysis (PBA. You may override certain billing profile settings prior to printing live bills.
You cannot use this option to adjust activity amounts or settings used to calculate invoice amounts. To make those kinds of changes, reject the activity, correct the billing profiles or the buy, then request the PBA Overnight Report again. Each live bill you release includes all billable activity for that product/ estimate. Bill numbers are determined by the range established in the Central Data Base for the owning company/office. The first two digits represent the current month; the next four are assigned sequentially within the range and restart each month. If Append Year to Bill No? is Y, in the billing profile, the last two digits of the current year appear at the end.
When you release billing for an activity month that has an outstanding Special Amount billing, the special amount is automatically reconciled on the bill. When bills are released, the system automatically generates the Released/Canceled Bills Report and the Client Invoice Register report. The system will also generate a Client Activity Report unless you specifically cancel it through this option.
Use the Draft Bills option to print draft bills after reviewing the PBA report and before releasing the actual bills through Live Bills Release. MediaBank A|V submits the PBA request nightly for clients on the billing calendar and for those scheduled for overnight processing through Billing Request. When you need to see draft bills on the same day, request the PBA and draft bills in one step using the Billing Request option. Although draft billing is optional, it is a good way to identify billing errors before live bills are printed, reducing the need to reverse and reprint incorrect bills.
After the PBA prints, review it, then print and check the draft bills. If you find errors, correct the billing profile settings and/or the buy and then resubmit the PBA. Once you are satisfied with the draft bills, release the live bills using Live Bills Release.
Printing draft bills does not update the financial registers or affect special amount bills. The system automatically generates the Released Draft Bills Report to show the activity that was selected for billing.