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What Experts Say About Service Billing In 2021

What Experts Say About Service Billing In 2021

There has been a lot of dynamics in the billing industry, and most growth evolves around service billing. Many companies have created as-a-service models or even moved completely to subscription billing. Still, service billing is much more than just those two areas, as mature service organizations can tell.

Billing trends and players blog

In this blog, we will look at the latest trends after a conversation with Igor Stenmark, the billing expert from MGI Research.

You might also want to view an on-demand webinar about Service Billing Trends and Players, where Igor Stenmark and Taija Engman discuss the topic. 

The Move To Subscription Billing Means New Billing Capabilities Are Needed

In today’s competitive environment, many companies move to subscription or usage-based billing and as-a-service business models. Even no commitment billing models or pay-per-use models are general.

Moving from traditional billing to as-a-service means much more than just modernizing your billing system. Many processes and metrics need to be re-designed. As a result, 4 out of 5 companies find themselves challenged in the transformation and find that they lack the tools, skill sets, and billing solutions to handle the new needs. They start looking at alternative billing systems beyond traditional ERP.

Key Areas To Look Into When Transforming To Service Billing

Service billing is fundamentally different from traditional product billing. In service billing, there are the key signs showing that your system needs a revision:

  • Revenue leakage eats growth and profits.
  • Too much manual work, and related to that: slow cash flow due to long processes
  • Slow time to market with new offerings, the billing system turns out to be a bottle-neck
  • Lower customer satisfaction due to billing problems
  • Challenges in transparency in IFRS and GAAP compliance related to billing workarounds.


The 3 Core Features Of a Good Service Billing Solution

According to MGI, there are 3 core capacities that define a good service billing solution:

  1. Granular data processing: the ability to deliver critical metric data, on which the billing can be based. 
  2. Customer Experience-driven: the ability to generate invoices and other customer communication that minimizes customer friction.
  3. Versatility: the ability to handle a broad range of pricing models, manage subscribers, and provisioning services effectively.

Do Your Due Diligence When Choosing An Agile Billing Solution

The advice Igor Stenmark offers companies looking to enhance their service billing capacities are:
  • Define your billing needs for the next 36-48 months ahead, so your system can grow with you.
  • Build a clear and concise set of use scenarios to evaluate your potential suppliers
  • Get to know your potential suppliers to find a good fit. Not just technical, but also operational and cultural and ask for references early in the process.

Take Us To The Test!

If you feel your billing needs will outgrow your current recurring revenue billing solution-, or are just curious to learn how Good Sign does things differently, feel free to take us to the test!

We will gladly take on your challenge and prove to you it can be done, and that the new world lies beyond just subscriptions.

Watch an on-demand webinar about Service Billing Trends and Players:
  • What makes service billing different from traditional billing?
  • How to cater for subscription billing and usage-based billing?
  • How does servitization add requirements to billing?
  • Real-life examples of service billing with clients
  • MGI Research's advice on what you should look for in a service billing solution
  • Hands-on tips on different aspects of recurring billing that deserve additional attention.

Webinar 2 image Linkedin


Feel free to contact us and let’s have a chat on how we can support your company.

 

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