How can I print a note on a customer's bill?

A bill can be more than just a list of charges and a balance owed. You may want to convey other information to one or all customers: detailed contract terms, a reminder of their pickup days and how many cans they’re allowed, a holiday greeting, a notification that the account is past due, an explanation of an odd charge. In addition to printing payment terms, Trash Flow allows you to print five different kinds of notes on customer statements and invoices.

• Text Message (all customers)

You can set up a text message that will print on all customer statements and invoices. Click System > Setup > Message Text On Bills. Type the message that you want to appear (or copy and paste from an existing document), then click Save and Exit. When you print bills, be sure to set Include Text Message to Yes.

• Message Lines on Bill Printings (all customers)

You can enter a brief message that will appear on one particular run of bills. Click Billing > Bill and Print, Print/Email Bills/Cards. After you choose a bill format and click OK, type the message you want to appear in “Message Line 1” and “Message Line 2.” Each line can contain up to 30 characters.

• Past Due Notifications (all customers)

You can include a bill notification to inform customers when their accounts are past due. Click Billing > Bill and Print, Print/Email Bills/Cards. After you choose a bill format and click OK, type the message you want to appear in “30 Day Note,” “60 Day Note,” and/or “90 Day Note.” The message will automatically appear on bills for customers who have been carrying an outstanding balance for at least that many days.

• Customer Charge note (individual customer)

You can create a dated note on a customer’s account that works much like a transaction. The note doesn’t affect their balance, but does appear in the customer history and will print on bills like other transactions. Open a customer account and go to the Charge tab. Use the drop-down menu to change the Type from Code to Note. Type the note you want to appear in the box below, then click Save. Once the note is created it shows up in the customer history much like a transaction, with the word “Note” next to the date. You can right-click the entry and click View Note to see what was written; right-click again and click Close to return to the customer’s history.

• Rate tab Description (individual customer)

You can enter a Description on a customer’s Rates tab without using an accompanying bill code or rate. The description will appear much like a transaction in the customer history whenever you assess charges. An example: Say you’ve given a customer a bill code called TRS with a description of “Trash Service” and a rate of $30.00. However, you want to give this customer more details about their service when you print bills. You can enter a Description in another line on the Rates tab such as “1 pickup/wk, Tues.” When you assess charges, be sure to set “Include Zero Charges” to Yes; this setting affects whether the description will be included in the assessment.