One of the biggest challenges facing technology partners is ensuring the accurate and effective billing of SaaS products.

Unlike bricks-and-mortar premises, where every item can be individually barcoded and priced, the licenses and access privileges involved in SaaS tend to demand flexible billing and a variety of payment vehicles. And of course, it falls on you to manage it all.

Knowing how to bill for SaaS has become increasingly challenging, but solutions exist. Let’s break down this problem. 

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Common Saas Billing Challenges - And How To Fix Them

To resolve an issue, we first have to define it. And today’s online-only market poses a variety of challenges compared to the one-time purchase model of the past. 

• Subscription models can range from annual to monthly, from one-time to recurring, and from single-license to multiple-device or multi-user accounts.
• Many SaaS firms offer discounts and incentives to encourage renewal or loyalty, creating a variety of different payment tiers for the same package or offering.
• The modular nature of applications like website design means customers may add extra services spontaneously, paid upfront or added to their next bill.
• Data may be charged based on units or consumption—the difference between annual licenses and pay-as-you-go contracts.
• Customers on a rolling contract will expect renewal payments to be taken seamlessly, without even having to think about doing a transaction.
• Expired card details lead to failed payments, which may either be overlooked or result in account suspension when a quick update is all that’s required. 

Manually processing an array of SaaS payment plans would be a logistical nightmare, especially as a company expands and diversifies. 

It would inevitably lead to revenue leakage through unbilled services and lapsed customer accounts, potentially causing frustration (and damaging the brand’s standing) among consumers who were being incorrectly charged.

This is where Zomentum Connect comes into play - the billing and license reconciliation software that streamlines billing processes and instantly maximizes revenue.

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How License Reconciliation Automates the Complex Billing Process for Technology Partners

Automatic billing reconciliation software simplifies online billing with actions automatically occurring in response to upgrades, cancellations, and ad-hoc purchases. 

Eliminate human error

Your business would have multiple customers and there would be a divergence between customer A pays and what customer B pays. This would be a headache to calculate manually on a spreadsheet. By contrast, letting automated software decide how to calculate SaaS billings removes the manpower element almost entirely. It ensures far greater accuracy since human error is eliminated as far as possible. 

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Integrate discounts and pricing changes in minutes

Different billing periods can be offered across various currencies, integrating any discounts or free trials which may have been offered.

The best billing software and license reconciliation tools can instantly calculate issues like regional taxation, once the appropriate formulas have been entered. They can also incorporate pricing changes, enabling firms to develop new pricing models in minutes rather than laboriously having to change multiple spreadsheets. This simplifies introducing coupons or discounts, running time-limited sales, and even targetting deals for specific plans or clients. 

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Generate invoices in real-time

Every business will have its own back-office functionality. In our platform, for example, once any markups have been applied to the relevant fields, Excel and CSV files can be imported into our license reconciliation tool. From there we calculate who should be billed for what, generating invoices according to usage in real-time. 

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Reduce involuntary client churn

How do you know how much revenue you’re losing? You need smart alerts and notifications! If a product isn’t being billed for any reason, we’ll automatically send you an alert, while providing advanced reports on lost revenue on a daily or weekly basis. These insights make it easy to spot potential challenges (or opportunities) caused by changes to client behavior. The best technology helps you do what you need to do easily - we’ll look out for you.

For example, If customer X has stopped making in-month purchases, this can be quickly identified and communicated. Then staff can reach out to see if the client needs assistance, encouraging them to redirect lapsed spending toward other services. 

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Improve customer management and retention 

When you’re monitoring all this SaaS activity, it becomes increasingly difficult to manage licenses manually. In fact, one of our partners discovered they were losing €13,000 a year in unbilled licenses alone. On a manual setting, your technicians would have to spend their workdays sifting through documents to look for unbilled licenses. And your sales reps would have to spend time patching together invoices, rather than winning new business or creating proposals.

With automated billing software, your employees get precious time back to focus on what matters most. Removing the need to know how to calculate SaaS billings (or how to bill for SaaS activity) frees up staff to concentrate on areas like account management, new customer targeting, and so on.

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Improve Your MSP Business with Automated Licensing and Billing System

Maybe you too are grappling with the sheer complexity of the recurring billing process. Don’t let it go unchecked!

To make your license reconciliation process easier, we’re pleased to introduce Zomentum Connect. Now within our expanding revenue platform, you can easily streamline your billing process while automatically synchronizing your customer licensing information to your PSA. 

Managing licenses manually is a headache! Take the pain out of billing and recoup revenue you didn’t know you was missing - Try it out. Sign up for a demo.