Billing

Billing system is a software package that records the volume of services consumed by subscribers, calculates and debits funds in accordance with the company's tariffs.

Billing is the process of determining the cost of services. The concept of "billing" is traditionally associated with the communications industry.

Functions and capabilities of billing systems

Billing systems provide ample opportunities for:

• Accounting and charging of the services provided.
• Settlement with subscribers and consumers - registration of contracts for the provision of services, accounting of payments, work with receivables.
• Manage settlements with suppliers, partners, dealers and agents.

Convergent billing systems, which allow you to take into account the provision of heterogeneous services and different types of payment in a single system, provide additional competitive advantages in market conditions.

At the moment, the following features are standard for converged billing:

• Set up for processing data from any telecommunication equipment and charging services both in batch mode and in real time.
• Support of a single base of clients (legal entities and individuals), which allows, among other things, to reduce possible abuses by unscrupulous payers.
• Creation of hierarchies of personal accounts that are convenient for both service providers (including for accounting for both own and partner services) and consumers who are able to track settlements on services provided to subsidiaries (for legal entities), relatives and friends (for individuals).
• Combining different channels and payment schemes for the services provided, allowing subscribers to easily maintain a positive balance of controlled personal accounts.
• Support for complex tariff plans and bonus programs that increase customer loyalty.

Thus, we can say that convergent billing is the technological basis for managing the profitability of services and developing a customer-oriented approach, which is now being paid special attention. Billing systems acquire additional advantages to increase customer loyalty when integrating with CRM systems and portal solutions.

An important aspect of the implementation of any billing system is its integration with:

• Payment systems (various systems "Client-Bank," CyberPlat  , etc.).
• ERP systems and financial accounting systems.
• OSS solutions.

Suppliers

• Red Hat
• Bercut
• CBOSS
• EHPT (Ericsson Hewlett-Packard Telecommunications) is an application software and service provider for telecom operators.
• Convergys - billing software.
• Ideco ACR - billing for telecom operators.
• INOTECH (InoTech) - billing, OSS/BSS of systems, software.
• Logica ACR - billing, Pre-paid systems - developer.
• Narus - Pre-paid system and real-time billing for GPRS and 3G.
• Portal Software - software for working with clients and billing in packet switching systems.
• Protek Flagship LLC (formerly Flagship Telesystems) - billing systems (ACR).
• SAP SE - billing software.
• Solect - ACP.
• TCI-Telesens - billing software.
• The Geneva Technology - Billing for GPRS.
• Veramark Technologies - ACR and billing management.
• Amdocs - billing software and subscriber service management systems for the telecommunications and IP industries.
• Actidata is a provider of smart buffers for collecting and storing information about telephone conversations.
• Amphitel - ACR.
• Atlant-Inform - ACR.
• East Wind - billing software, Pre-paid systems, clearing center, Voice Mail, Contact Center, MMS, SMS, USSD, subscriber self-service systems.
• Intasis Management Systems - billing software.
• InfoTeCS - billing software (ACR).
• Comte Plus - billing software.
• Kraftsvyaz-Novosibirsk - billing software.
• Megatel - billing software (ACP).
• Telecomproduct is a universal billing system for traditional and IP telephony operators.
• Peter-Service - development, installation and maintenance of billing systems.
• Professional Information Technologies is the developer of the Billion billing system for cellular communications of the standard. GSM
• Request - Request Billing System.
• Reksoft - solutions for accounting and billing telecommunications services Barsum.
• CyberShell is a developer of billing systems for any telecom operator.
• ServoComp - billing software.
• SNYIP-Softel - billing software (ACR).
• Soft-Pro is a manufacturer and supplier of information technology for telecommunications, billing software (ACP), a number of other auxiliary hardware and systems for mobile operators.
• Telesoft-Russia - billing software (ACR).
• Forward (Forward Telecom)
• Force Holding - ACR Fastcom.
• ERTel - software development in the field of telecommunications.
• Request Billing - Request Company
• BGBilling
• Bill-Master (Billmaster)

The role of billing in the formation of tariff lines

According to a global study by Amdocs and Heavy Reading, a telecom operator needs to integrate billing and policy management systems to form new price strategies in data services.

Telecommunications companies need to repay funds invested in the construction of new communication networks. All of them are faced with the task of forming such a tariff policy that would bring them maximum profits. "We predict the emergence of a large number of different tariffs, since with the advent of new tablet computers and smartphones, such as the iPhone, Black Berry Touch and Nokia N-series, traffic consumption has increased avalanche-like," said Heavy Reading senior analyst Aria Banerji (AriBanerjee).

According to him, that is why the integration of billing with solutions for managing price policies is now very relevant. At the same time, operators are looking for ready-made solutions, since attempts to integrate these systems together by internal departments often fail and require unnecessary costs.

So, during the study, 83% of respondents said that their marketing departments ask IT departments about the possibility of creating innovative tariffs for data services. More than 90% said they wanted to develop tariffs for different lines of business, customer types and payment methods. In addition, 86% of telecommunications service providers plan to launch tariffs of various classes, and 82% plan to create special tariffs for various devices. At the same time, 67% are preparing "family" tariff plans.

85% of respondents are confident in the need to integrate billing systems and policy management. This integration will allow service providers to offer their subscribers tariffs that meet their needs, depending on the type of devices, network status, client information and other parameters.

IT departments find this task challenging. 80% of respondents are not sure that their policy management systems will be able to process new rules related to networks (for example, channel width control) and consumption (payment methods, traffic limits). 10% have already tried to integrate billing and policy management and failed.

Amdocs notes that the new services should be simple and intuitive for ordinary subscribers. Price strategies based on the volume of consumption can help in this. For example, a service for showing films online must take into account the amount of traffic and the necessary speed in advance for comfortable viewing, for which customers will be ready to pay more.

Problems of using billing systems

Today's automated settlement systems for communication services impede the development of new communication services. This opinion is shared by 92% of the 50 senior managers of large communications and media companies in Africa, Europe Latin America and the Middle East who took part in the company's telephone survey. Accenture At the same time, almost every second respondent considers billing as the main barrier to launching new products and services.

The main reasons for dissatisfaction are insufficient calculation accuracy, complexity of billing converged services and poor network scalability in light of the growing volume of transmitted data. 70% of respondents consider their billing systems not meeting market requirements, because 84% of operators who took part in the study are forced to spend from two months on reconfiguring payment opportunities. The same 70% complain about the insufficient integration of billing with other corporate systems, in particular, CRM.

A necessary (but obviously insufficient) condition for the growth of business profitability in the context of growing competition in the market of telecom operator services, 60% of respondents called convergent billing - a system of single calculation for all services provided. First of all, this applies to the services provided within the framework of the triple-play and quad-play concepts. At the same time, 79% of respondents believe that accounts should be formed in real time.

It is assumed that the next generation billing systems in the next two to three years will untie the hands of progressive operators. They will be able to offer products and services for different target groups (80%), introduce new opportunities to support the launch of products and services (72%). By some margin in terms of importance are the quality of billing and its performance - 62% and 55%, respectively.

Naturally, the introduction of new technologies is the key to growth in the next two to three years, first of all, telecom operators in emerging markets, which include Russia. If in mature markets only 48% of respondents invest or intend to invest in complex solutions for billing systems, then in developing markets - all 88%.

Automation of calculations

Main article: Automation of calculations

Market estimates

2023: Russian billing systems market grew 65% to RUB 4,697 mln - Strategy Partners

With the growth of the business the Russian , customers are increasing the need for automation of processes related to. In billing 2023, the billing systems market grew by ~ 65% to 4,697 million. rubles TAdviser the Russian consulting The company has shared such results since May 27, 2024. Strategy Partners

In 2023, a number of new solutions with infrastructure management functions appeared on the billing platform solutions market. The increase in competition among Russian vendors is due to the transfer of part of self-written solutions to the format of a market product. Often these solutions have a high application specificity and do not have significant market potential outside the narrow subsegment of the market.

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Strategy Partners

The market is mainly represented by large consumers (providers, financial institutions and B2B services) who have high specific product requirements, as well as small and medium-sized businesses looking for the most budgetary solutions.

Due to the high fragmentation of the market, demand is difficult to consolidate within a single product, which makes it difficult to create a leading product.

The full version of the Strategy Partners report on the results of a study on the Russian infrastructure software market and its development prospects can be found at the link.

2022: The Russian market for billing systems has doubled in a year

In 2022, the volume of the Russian billing systems market amounted to 4.7 billion rubles, having halved compared to a year ago. Such data are provided in a study by Strategy Partners, published in September 2023.

Billing systems are software that allows you to calculate billing, bill for the use of services, and record information about the user's account balance. Billing allows you to automatically bill the client for the services that were provided to him, Ilya Rogov, director of the St. Petersburg branch of Atomdaty, explained to Vedomosti. Traditionally, telecommunications companies have been and remain one of the key users of billing systems, many of them by September 2023 are developing areas related to cloud services, said Timofey Khoroshev, partner, leader of the technology consulting practice at DRT (formerly Deloitte).

The billing systems market in Russia may triple by 2030

The market for such systems in Russia is represented by a large number of both self-described solutions and narrow niche solutions. In total, they make up about 85-90% of the market in both Russian and international practice, the study says.

According to a report by Strategy Partners, in 2022, demand for billing shifted towards Open Source solutions, and domestic vendors increased their market share from 42% in 2022 to 59% in 2023. According to analysts' forecasts, in the future the market will grow by almost a quarter annually due to the growth of the number of users in the target segments and inflation of the cost of licenses, as well as through import substitution. The growth will be provided by new users of billing solutions and an increase in the number of services provided to their customers, as well as indexation of tariffs, researchers^[1] will^[2].

Chronicle

2021: Billing Architecture: A Foundation You Can't Save On

Any commercial company at some point begins to accept money from users for its services or goods. At the same time, many make the simplest decision - they conclude an agreement with a payment aggregator, which takes all the care. However, with the growth of the audience and the expansion of the market into new countries, there is a need to connect new payment methods, work with new currencies, be able to flexibly manage prices and discounts, work with money refunds, make financial reconciliations and report to auditors. From an engineering point of view, this means an exponential increase in the complexity of the billing system and an increasing dependence on it of external systems - financiers and budgeting, business analytics, marketing, customer support. How to build a billing that will work flawlessly, tells Engineering Manager in the international company Wheely Anatoly Ryabov. Read more here.

Sources

• Billing - Database, Sotovik
• Billing Systems, Microtest
• JBoss Rules (formerly Drools).

The topic of billing is also relevant for energy sales companies moving to market schemes for working with electricity consumers.

See also

BRM system

Notes