Configure Balance Template General Properties

General balance template properties include the balance instance creation policy, and prepaid, main balance, liability asset, and aggregate balance settings.

About this task

Configure general balance properties in Edit Balance when creating or changing a balance template. To define how taxes are applied to balance expiration forfeiture and whether tax fees could be charged to the actual currency balance, Actual Currency must be selected. For information about creating and changing balance templates, see the discussions about creating balance templates and changing balance templates. For information about defining balance expiration forfeiture, see the discussion about configuring balance template Tax/GST.
Note: If you enter conflicting input values when you define your template, the associated template tabs are highlighted and an error shows for each set of conflicting input values. The error shows until the conflicts are resolved.

Procedure

  1. In General, optionally configure any of the following properties.
    • Name
    • Description
    • External ID
  2. In Precision, enter the number of digits to the right of the decimal point that are used during rounding. The value must be an integer between 0 and 7.
  3. In Consumption Priority, enter a priority value for the balances instantiated from this template.
    This number defines the order in which valid balances are impacted during rating. The higher the number, the higher the priority. If you do not specify a priority, balances will be saved with a priority value of 0. Negative priority values are valid.
  4. In Balance Instance Creation Policy, select whether an instance from this balance template gets added to a subscriber or group wallet when an instance already exists in the wallet. This operation occurs when a product offer requiring the balance is included in a catalog item (bundle or product offer) that is purchased.
    • One per Start Time — If a balance instance exists in the wallet and it has the same start time as the one being added; no new instance is added to the wallet. The existing one is used. This is the default behavior.
    • One per Wallet — If a balance instance exists in the wallet, it is used regardless of its start time. No new instance is added to the wallet. This method is typically used when customers want subscribers to have one balance or meter impacted for all services they own. Note that if you use this balance instance creation policy for a currency balance, an additional optional property, Main Balance, can be specified. See main balance.
    • One per Offer Purchase — Always create a new balance instance, regardless of whether an instance already exists. This method always creates a new balance instance for each product offer requiring the balance that is associated with the catalog item being purchased. In this method, balances are created on a per product offer basis. For bundles featuring different product offers that require the same balance, each associated product offer will have its own balance instance.
    • One per Catalog Item Purchase — Always create one unique balance instance per catalog item purchased. The catalog item has either a product offer or bundle template. In this method, balances are created on a per purchase basis. In the case where the catalog item has a bundle template, if the bundle contains product offers that require the same balance template, this method creates only one balance instance for those product offers.
  5. (Available on simple balances only) Select Activate Balance Tracking to record per-transaction real-time balance information in MEFs.
  6. (Available on currency balances only) Select Actual Currency if this is an actual currency balance, for example, Euros, yen, or dollars.
  7. Select Aggregate to share this balance among members of a group and to track group member usage or balance quantities.
  8. If the balance is a simple, prepaid balance, the Balance Automatically Expires option displays and allows you to set any G/L balance instances created from this template to expire when the balance amount has been completely consumed. To enable this behavior, select Balance Automatically Expires.
  9. Select Create External Payment Request on an actual-currency balance (except postpaid main balances) to generate external payment requests before charges are applied to the balance.
  10. Select Device Specific to require that this balance apply to a device.
    This option is not available for main balances, aggregated balances, or postpaid actual currency balances. An offer with this balance cannot be purchased by a group.
  11. Select Dynamic to specify that the balance instance is dynamically created based on network usage events; the Dynamic tab displays.
    Note: Click Save before you click the Dynamic tab to enter dynamic data.
  12. (Optional for pseudo-currencies and asset balances only) Select Include in Cost to report this balance as an offer cost in rating results.
  13. If the balance is an asset or currency balance and is not a main balance, select Liability Asset to specify that the revenue recognition type is consumption-based.
    This is used to track revenue recognition for the generation of General Ledger information that can be included in Event Detail Records (EDRs).
  14. If the balance will be a main balance, select Main Balance.
    Note: To create a main balance, the balance must be a simple currency balance and Balance Instance Creation Policy must be One per Wallet.
  15. If the balance will contain a prepaid quantity, select Prepaid.
  16. Select Private Balance to require each offer that adds this balance in the required list to designate this balance as private. This allows multiple instances of the same product offer to operate independently and concurrently by allowing a balance range normalizer to use only the specific balances associated with each purchased instance of the product offer. For more information, see the discussion about private balances.
    Note: To select Private Balance, the Balance Instance Creation Policy must be set to either One Per Offer Purchase or One Per Catalog Item Purchase.
  17. To specify that virtual balances are created only in lower group tiers, select Aggregate and then select Suppress Higher Tier Virtual Balances. When deselected, virtual balances are created in all lower and higher group tiers.
  18. (Optional for currency balances only) Select Prohibited for Tax Fees to prevent the actual currency balance from being charged tax fees.
    Note: To select Prohibited for Tax Fees, Actual Currency must be selected.
  19. Select Report Highest Threshold Breaches Only to specify that only the highest threshold breach is reported in events and notifications.
  20. Click Save.
    Note: If you change any values in the fields above, you must click Save.