Invoice Rules are the basic building blocks of Spend Management. An invoice (or billing) represents the fees or expenses that have been billed, usually by outside counsel. It is scanned for compliance against these Invoice Rules, which can be set up specific to individual accounts or matters.
Invoice Rules Tab
The Invoice Rules tab displays a home page that lets you quickly create new invoice rules or navigate through a list of already-created rules. Invoice rules are executed for all new line items added to an invoice automatically and can be run on-demand on individual invoice line Items when they are edited.
Invoice rules are a set of invoice rule entries that scan for compliance based on the related account/matter, rates, or expenses. The set of invoice rule entries can be ordered, and based on that order, each invoice line item is scanned for compliance against these rule entries. Based on the rule options, if validated to be true on the conditions provided, the rule outcome is saved for the line items.
Invoice Rules have the following entities as basic building blocks:
Invoice Rule Entries
Invoice rule entries are the basic building blocks of an invoice rule. Each invoice rule entry includes a set of criteria, a set of actions, and the ability to set a state applied with a reason.
Invoice Rule Guidelines
Invoice rule guidelines are automatically generated for each invoice rule. The guidelines serve as a pre-defined set of rules that can be turned on/off at an individual invoice rule level. These may include checks like block billings using UTBMS codes, enforcing LEDES specification-based structure on uploaded invoices, etc. We can set an outcome state applied for each invoice rule guideline along with a reason.
Invoice Rule Budget
The invoice rule should be associated with a budget record to help evaluate against an invoice specific to the budget or estimates configured at an account or matter level. Budget-based rules allow users to configure rule options that evaluate related to the configured budget associated with specific UTBMS Codes or timekeeper roles and matters associated with the invoice line items against the allocation of funds and resources for the matter.
Matter Invoice Rules
An invoice rule must be assigned to matters before it can be used on invoices. The matter invoice rules related list shows all the matters associated with the invoice rule and will be applied for invoices associated with those matters.
Invoice rules are highly customizable and can be made active or inactive at various levels:
- Invoice rules can be made active/inactive.
- The association of an invoice rule with any matter can be made active/inactive.
- Any invoice rule guideline within the invoice rule can be made active/inactive.
- Any invoice rule entry within the invoice rule can be made active/inactive.