General Meter Properties

General meter properties include a meter ID, name, and validity period, and define whether the meter tracks usage or charges, is measuring an amount or is a turnstile meter, and if it is standard or periodic, prepaid or postpaid, and aggregate. Meters can have associated thresholds, filters, and attributes, but these are considered referenced items and not properties.

General Meter Properties lists the general meter properties.

Table 1. General Meter Properties
Property Description
ID An auto-generated unique ID used internally during rating to locate the meter.
Name A descriptive name for the meter. Meter names are displayed in rate tables.
Description Information about the purpose of the meter.
External ID (Optional) Use this field to identify this item in MATRIXX pricing items. An External ID is saved to the pricing configuration file and loaded into the Pricing Database. Set the External ID value to any alphanumeric character that is meaningful to your implementation. An External ID can be used, for example, to relate offers in the MATRIXX system to products in an external pricing plan. It can be used, for example, by the Subscriber Management API to query and purchase product offers and bundle IDs.
Precision The number of digits to the right of the decimal point that are used to express the meter value; the value must be an integer between 0 and 7. It is the position at which fractional rating results are rounded. Currencies typically have a precision of 2.
Instance Creation Policy Determines whether a new meter instance is added to a wallet when the offer requiring the meter is purchased.
  • One per Start Time — If a meter 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 meter 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 meter impacted for all services they own.
  • One per Offer Purchase — Always create one unique meter instance per product offer purchased. The purchase offer has either an offer or bundle template. In this method, meters are created on a per purchase basis. In the case where the offer has a bundle template, if the bundle has offers that require the same meter template, this method creates only one meter instance for those offers.
  • One per Catalog Item Purchase — Always create one unique meter instance per catalog item purchased. The catalog item has either an offer or bundle template. In this method, meters are created on a per purchase basis. In the case where the catalog item has a bundle template, if the bundle has offers that require the same meter template, this method creates only one meter instance for those offers.
Aggregate Specifies that the meter will be added to a group wallet and the quantity shared among members of a group.
Device Specific Specifies that the meter tracks currency or other assets for a device. An offer with this meter cannot be purchased by a group.
Dynamic When selected, the meter instance is dynamically created based on network usage events.
Suppress Higher Tier Virtual Balances You must select Aggregate to enable this feature.

When selected, specifies that when an aggregate balance is created through purchase of an offer requiring this template, virtual balances are created only in lower group tiers. When deselected, virtual balances are created in both lower and higher group tiers.
Report Highest Threshold Breaches Only Specifies that only the highest threshold breach is reported in events and notifications. Otherwise events and notifications are always sent.