A sales subscription is a template that describes what is to be invoiced, how often and in what way. The template is not activated directly towards the customers – that happens via customer subscription contracts (see the "Subscriptions" tab at the bottom of the edit screen), which link the subscription to a specific customer and control the start date and discount.
Subscription management is particularly useful for recurring charges such as rent, membership fees and subscription-based services. The module is an add-on to the Sapera solution – contact the sales department for further information.
Sapera supports two variants of subscription templates:
Subscription is the ordinary variant for recurring charges of fixed, defined item lines.
Rental is the variant for rental contracts with serial numbers (accessed via the menu item "Rental contracts" under Sales). The template structure is identical to Subscription, but the rental variant shows a "Rented out" grid with serial numbers instead of standard item lines.
A sales subscription is used as a template in the following contexts:
Customer subscription contracts (the menu item "Customer contracts" under Sales) reference a subscription template and define when and at what price the relevant customer is invoiced. The invoicing is done by running the subscription via the "Run" button.
The "Based on subscription" tab of invoices and sales orders shows which subscription a document originates from.
The "Run" dialog (RunSubscriptionsGridDialog) uses the subscription template to gather the customer contracts that are ready for invoicing.
The subscription can also be opened as a dialog from the invoice overview.
Open Financial and click Sales in the menu. Then select Subscriptions.
You are now in the overview of subscription templates.
If you cannot see the menu item, you most likely do not have permission for it. Contact support.
The overview shows all defined subscription templates in a grid view with the following columns: System name, Display name, Period, Invoicing method, Start date, Expected next run, Last run period, Date (created), Is paused and Deleted.
If Billwerk integration is set up in the system, the column Integrated with Billwerk is also shown.
Columns can be added and removed via the column selector.
+ (Create new) is always active and opens the creation screen for a new subscription.
Edit (pencil icon) is active when a row is selected, and opens the edit screen for the selected subscription. Double-clicking a row gives the same result.
Remove (X icon) is active when a row is selected, and marks the subscription as deleted (soft delete with validation). Already created invoices and sales orders are not affected.
Pause is active when the selected subscription is not already paused, and stops future runs for this subscription.
Activate is only shown when the selected subscription is paused, and reactivates the subscription so that future runs are resumed.
Show runs is active when a row is selected, and opens the Subscription archive popup with historical run requisitions.
Show history is active when a row is selected, and opens the History popup with the invoices and sales orders created via this subscription.
Run is always active and opens the "Run subscriptions" dialog, where you select and perform an invoicing run across all subscriptions.
Export report is always active and exports the list's data to a report.
Refresh is always active and reloads the overview.
Help (?) is always active and opens this article.
Click + (Create new) or Edit to open the edit screen. The screen is divided into master data and settings on the left, item lines on the right and tabs with customer contracts and attachments at the bottom.
Finish with Save and close in the bottom right.
Show history is active if the subscription has been run, and opens the history dialog for this subscription.
Run is active for existing (non-new) subscriptions and opens the "Run" dialog limited to this subscription.
Show runs is only visible to administrators on existing subscriptions and opens the subscription archive for this subscription.
Text product is only shown if a text product is configured in the Financial settings, and opens the product dialog.
Try synchronizing to Billwerk again is only shown if a Billwerk synchronization is missing, and retries the synchronization.
If the subscription is paused, a warning banner is shown at the top of the edit screen.
If the text product is not set up in the Financial settings, a warning is shown in the bottom left with the text "Text product is not set up in Financial settings".
System name: An internal, unique reference for the subscription. Can only be specified at creation and cannot be changed afterwards.
Display name: The user-friendly name of the subscription, shown to the users and on invoices/sales orders.
Organizational unit: Shown as a read-only label (not editable in the form). Specifies which organizational unit the subscription belongs to.
Last run period: Read-only label. Shows which period the last run covered.
Expected next run: Read-only label. Shows the expected date for the next invoicing.
Period: Defines how often the subscription is run. The options are: Daily, Weekly, Every other week, Monthly, Every other month, Quarterly, Semi-annually and Annually.
Start date: The date of the subscription's starting point, used for calculating run dates.
Period adjustment: Controls how the customer subscription contract's start date relates to the subscription template's period. The options are "Adjust start to follow subscription" (the contract's invoicing periods are adjusted to follow the subscription's start date) and "Follow the subscription contract's start" (the periods are calculated from the contract's own start date). This field is decisive for whether customers with different start dates are invoiced at the same time or individually.
Create sales order or invoice: Determines whether a run generates an invoice or a sales order. The options are Invoice and Sales order.
Creation state (for Invoice): Shown only when the invoicing method is "Invoice". Currently the only option is "Draft", which means that the invoice is created as a draft and must be posted manually.
Creation state (for Sales order): Shown only when the invoicing method is "Sales order". The options are: Draft, Started and Collective invoicing. "Collective invoicing" gathers the charges into a mass invoicing.
Action code: Only available for the Subscription type. Specifies which action code is used when running the subscription.
Action code to be used when new lines are added manually: Only for the Subscription type. Specifies the action code that is automatically used when a case handler adds new item lines manually in a run.
Number of periods to include in the first run: Specifies how many periods are to be invoiced the very first time the subscription is run for a customer. Useful for back-dated charges.
Accrual: Only active for quarterly and annual periods. Enables accounting accrual over 3 months, 4 quarters or 12 months.
Add line with display name to invoice/order: When checked, a text line with the subscription's display name is added to the generated invoice or sales order.
Add line with period to invoice/order: When checked, a text line with the invoicing period is added to the document.
Add line with subject: When checked, a text line with the subject is added to the document.
Add line with serial number: When checked, a text line with the serial number is added to the document.
Split invoice/order per customer: When checked, a separate document is created per customer instead of one combined document. The field is hidden for the Rental type.
Should be integrated with Billwerk: Only visible if Billwerk integration is set up in the system. Specifies whether this subscription should be synchronized and handled in Billwerk.
Handled in Billwerk (UUID): Shown only as a read-only label if Billwerk integration is active and the synchronization has completed correctly. Shows the internal Billwerk ID for the subscription.
On the right side of the edit screen the item lines that are invoiced at each run are defined.
The grid contains the columns Item number, Name, Quantity, Price excl. VAT and Price incl. VAT. At least one item line is required.
The lines can be rearranged with Move up and Move down (arrow symbols) and removed with Remove selected line (X).
Lines to be added automatically to the first charge is a separate section that is only shown for the Subscription type. Here you add items that are only to be invoiced at the very first run for a given customer, e.g. a setup fee.
Rented out (Rental options) is only shown for the Rental type and contains the column Serial number item (instance), which specifies which specific serial-numbered items are included in the rental agreement.
Under the Subscriptions tab at the bottom of the edit screen the customer subscription contracts linked to this template are shown and created.
Click + Create to link a new customer. Here individual start dates, discounts and any fixed prices are specified for the individual customers on the subscription.
It is via these customer contracts that the actual invoicing is activated when you run the subscription.
Under the Attachments tab you can link files and documents to the subscription, e.g. contracts or documentation.
The grid shows the columns Title, File name, Content type and Created on.
+ (Add attachment) adds a new file.
Delete attachment (X) deletes the selected file.
Download attachment downloads the selected file to your computer.
The "Show history" popup is opened from the overview or the edit screen and shows a list of invoices and sales orders generated via runs of this subscription.
Subscription shows which subscription the record originates from.
Customer shows which customer has been invoiced.
Date is the invoicing or order date.
Sales order number is shown if the document is a sales order.
Invoice number is shown if the document is an invoice.
Cancelled indicates with yes/no whether the document is cancelled (discarded).
Click Open or double-click a row to open the relevant document directly.
The "Show runs" popup is opened from the overview or the edit screen and shows the history of run requisitions – i.e. the run batch requests that have been started for this subscription.
Created on is the time of the run request's creation.
Subscriptions shows the names of the subscriptions included in the run.
Created by shows the user who started the run.
Date is the invoicing date the run covered.
Invoicing method shows whether the run generated invoices or sales orders.
Status shows the run's current status (e.g. pending, completed, failed).
Split per customer indicates with yes/no whether the documents in this run were split per customer.
Show errors is active if the selected record has errors, and shows the error detail.
Show history is active if a record is selected, and opens the history popup for the selected run.
The "Run subscriptions" dialog is opened from the Run button in the overview or the edit screen. It shows the customer subscription contracts that are ready to be invoiced.
Rows are color-coded according to the run's timing:
White rows (type "Next run") are normal and ready for the next scheduled invoicing.
Yellow rows (type "Current period") indicate that the relevant contract is in the current period and has not yet been run.
Red rows (type "Previous runs") indicate that the contract is overdue and should have been run in a previous period.
Checkbox is used to select the contracts that are to be included in the run.
Next run shows the date of the scheduled run.
Type shows the run's timing: Next run (normal), Current period (yellow warning) or Previous runs (red error).
Subscription shows the subscription template's display name.
Customer shows the customer on the relevant contract.
Debtor category shows the customer's debtor category.
Customer subscription no. shows the contract's number.
Select all rows checks all visible rows at once.
Run is active when at least one contract is marked, and starts the invoicing run for the selected contracts. The system generates invoices or sales orders based on the selected creation state.
Right-click (or long press) on a row opens a context menu with three actions:
Open customer opens the customer card for the relevant customer.
Open subscription opens the subscription template as a dialog.
Open subscription contract opens the specific customer subscription contract.
Billwerk integration is an optional add-on that enables automatic charging via the Billwerk payment platform. The fields and functions below are only visible if Billwerk is set up in the system.
Should be integrated with Billwerk (checkbox in the edit screen): Enables synchronization of this subscription to Billwerk, so that the customer's payment is handled automatically.
Handled in Billwerk (UUID) (read-only label in the edit screen): Shown when the synchronization is completed, and shows the subscription's internal Billwerk identifier.
Try synchronizing to Billwerk again (button in the edit screen): Shown only if the synchronization to Billwerk is not completed. Click to retry.
Integrated with Billwerk (column in the overview): Shows with yes/no whether the relevant subscription is integrated with Billwerk.
If you have any questions, you are welcome to contact support.
Want to know more?
Read more in these related articles:
New / edit subscription
This article walks through how to access and create or edit subscriptions in Sapera
Customer subscriptions
How to create, edit and run customer subscriptions in Financial. The article walks through the list, edit dialog, history popup and batch run dialog.
Subscription archive
In this article we walk through the use of the subscription archive in Sapera.
