Using custom billing allocation

The Custom Billing feature can be used to manage how much the client will be invoiced for campaign activity each month. 

Once this feature has been enabled, the custom billing allocation can be managed under the billing section of the campaign by clicking on the publisher's name:

All confirmed placements for this publisher will be visible:

Depending on the account configuration, either four or five allocation methods are available to select:

- Pro Rata (Day): when selecting this allocation method the split will be spread evenly across each month factoring in the number of days in the month. In the following example because June is a shorter month than May and July the spend allocations reflect this:

This allocation will also factor in campaign start and end dates. The following example has a total spend of $6,000, the start date of 16 May and end date 30 June so the spend is allocated accordingly:

- Even Monthly: when selecting this allocation method the spend will be split evenly across the months regardless of the month length and start/end dates

- First Month: all spend will be allocated to the first month of activity

- Last Month: all spend will be allocated to the last month of activity

Some users may also see the following fifth allocation option: ProRata by Volume. This allocation distributes costs according to projected delivery. Costs are split according to the number of days in a flight or the goal set per flight. Cost distribution takes into consideration flighting and flight goals to ensure data accuracy. This additional allocation type has only been activated for certain markets, contact your Symphony Administrator to request this feature.

In addition to this, you are able to manually adjust the billing amount for each month (excluding the last month) using the customise feature. The last month is not customisable because a calculation will occur in Symphony automatically allocating all spend not assigned to a month to the final month of activity.

To activate customisation, select custom by clicking on the spend for each month as necessary:

In the following example, the total spend for this placement is $10,000. 

By selecting custom and entering $4,000 in the first month of activity, the other two months spend will be adjusted depending on the allocation type selected.

In this screenshot because even monthly is selected, the remaining $6,000 has been split evenly over the remaining two months:

In this screenshot, because Pro Rata (Day) is selected, the remaining $6,000 has been split across the remaining two months factoring in the length of each month. Because June is a shorter month than July the monthly allocation reflects this:

If the campaign end date was 15 July (half way through the month) then the allocation for July will be half that of the month of June where the placement was live for the entire month:

It is also possible to enable the custom feature for the second month. The final month of activity will then automatically calculate the remaining unallocated spend:

If the values entered into each month do not match the total you will not be able to save the allocations you have entered for export. The total for each placement is available for reference in the last column.

If the customise feature is activated for a particular month, this is indicated by the pencil icon:

Some agencies may also have the lock feature available for each month. This allows users to lock the value entered for a particular month so it cannot be edited. This feature is designed to be used when a particular month has already been invoiced and should therefore not be edited but allocations for following months may need to be adjusted. To activate this feature, contact your Symphony Administrator.

If a month has been locked this is indicated by a padlock icon:

Another option for locking is to use the bulk lock feature if you wish to lock all placements.

Once spend allocation is complete, click the blue save button. You will then see the following message in green advising changes have been saved. Click the back to publishers button below the green confirmation message to export the XML billing file.