Rate Structure : Rate type determination

Rate Structure 

Purpose

You store the billing rules for the utility company in this component. The rate is the most important element of billing. The appropriate rate is derived from the rate category and the rate type during rate determination. A rate category is allocated to each utility installation. It contains data that controls the cross-rate processing of meter reading data and billing. The data can be overridden by individual specifications in the installation. The rate typeestablishes the rate allocation of the registers and is usually stored in the installation structure. It can also be stored in the rate category or in the installation, for example, in the case of flat-rate installations. The graphic below illustrates the interaction between the different elements of contract billing.

This indirect rate allocation in conjunction with a rate type has advantages if you want to change a rate. You must only enter a new rate category for the utility installations concerned and enhance the rate determination. You are not required to change the rate types for each individual register of the affected installations.

Interaction Between Billing Master Data

Operands are descriptive variables defined by the utility company. The rate allocates values – such as price or demand – to the operands. The operand values serve as input and output parameters for the variant programs. The contractual billing rules are stored in the variant programs (for example, quantity x price). You define how billing values such as measured consumption or demand are to be processed and calculated. The billing schema groups together one or more rates and determines the sequence in which the variant programs for the rates to be billed are executed.

Integration

You allocate rate types to a device in the Installation component (ISU-DMDIIN) or later during maintenance in theInstallation Structure (ISU-DMDIIS).

If you want to bill profiles, use the RTP interface and allocate it to the rate.