Recurring billing schedules¶
A service agreement can carry a fee — a monthly maintenance charge, an annual inspection retainer. A billing schedule is what turns that fee into invoices on a repeating cycle, so you are not raising the same invoice by hand every month.
Pro and Enterprise feature
Service agreements are available on the Pro and Enterprise plans. On Pro, an agreement covers a customer or one of their sites, with labor-only or inspection-only coverage, and its fee can be billed. Agreements tied to individual equipment and coverage that includes parts need the Enterprise plan, because they build on asset management and inventory. Compare plans to find the right fit for your business.
Without a schedule, an agreement fee is just a number recorded on the agreement. The schedule is the part that bills it.
Before you start¶
Two things have to be true:
- The agreement already carries a fee. Enter the monthly or annual fee on the agreement first. An agreement with no fee has nothing to bill, and the form will say so rather than create an empty schedule.
- You have financial permissions. Owners and asset managers can set up agreement billing. Everyone else can see the schedule but cannot change it.
Creating a schedule¶
You can start from either place:
- From the agreement form. Choose Billed by FSM Navigator in Agreement Fee Billing and click Save Contract. The billing window below opens straight away. See agreement fee billing.
- From the agreement list, using the steps below.
To start from the agreement list:
- Open Service Contracts from the side menu.
- Find the agreement in the list and click Billing on its row.
- Fill in three fields:
| Field | What it decides |
|---|---|
| Billing Cadence | How often the fee is invoiced — Monthly or Annual |
| First Period Starts | The date the first billing period opens. Leave it blank to start from the agreement's own start date. It cannot be earlier than that date |
| Invoice at the start of each period | Tick to bill in advance. Leave it off to bill at the end of each period instead |
- Click Create billing schedule.
Creating the schedule also changes the agreement's fee handling to Billed by FSM Navigator — see agreement fee billing for what the three modes mean.
The anchor date sets the day of the month
If the first period starts on the 15th, every later monthly period starts on the 15th. Where a month is too short for the chosen day — the 31st in a 30-day month — that period is pulled back to the last day of the month, and the following month returns to the 31st. The day you picked is kept, not quietly walked backwards.
What happens next¶
The schedule lays out billing periods — a numbered run of date ranges, each one covering one cadence step. The modal lists them with their start, end, status, and the amount billed.
Each period is invoiced automatically once it is due: at the period's start if you chose to bill in advance, otherwise after it ends. The invoice appears under Invoices like any other, and the period then reads invoiced.
| Status | Meaning |
|---|---|
| claimed | The period is recorded and waiting for its invoice |
| invoiced | The fee has been invoiced for this period |
| skipped | The period was closed without an invoice, with the reason recorded |
| cancelled | The period was voided — for example the schedule was removed |
Turning billing on never backdates invoices
If the agreement started months ago, the periods that already ended are closed as skipped rather than billed. The confirmation tells you how many, and billing starts from the next period. Switching this on cannot surprise a customer with a stack of historical invoices.
Part-period charges¶
When a period is only partly served — the agreement ends mid-period, or the first period starts partway through — the fee is charged for the days actually served rather than the whole period.
The share is worked out against that period's own length, so a 31-day month is divided by 31 and a 28-day February by 28. There is no averaged 30-day month and no rounding applied per day: the charge is calculated once, for the period, in whole cents.
Worked example. A $1,200.00 annual fee on a 365-day period, with coverage ending after 90 days served, bills \(1,200.00 × 90 ÷ 365 = **\)295.89**.
A period that was served in full is billed in full — it is never shown as a part charge just because the arithmetic could be written that way.
Pausing, resuming and removing¶
The modal gives you three controls once a schedule exists:
- Pause billing — stops new invoices without discarding the schedule. Its status reads Paused. Use this for a customer on hold.
- Resume billing — picks the cycle back up.
- Remove schedule — stops future invoices for good. The agreement then falls back to Billed outside FSM Navigator if it still carries a fee, or Included at no charge if it does not. Invoices already issued are kept — removing a schedule never deletes billing history.
An agreement can hold one schedule at a time. If you need different terms, remove the existing schedule and create a new one.
Related guides¶
- Agreement fee billing — the three ways an agreement fee is handled
- Creating a service agreement — where the fee itself is entered
- Pausing and removing an agreement — ending the agreement rather than its billing
- Creating invoices — what happens to the invoice once it is raised