The plan types
| Plan | Attached to | Answers |
|---|---|---|
| Billing plan | Account | When are invoices produced and due? Lead time, invoice fees, low-balance rules, payment reversal fees. |
| Payment plan | PolicyPeriod | How is premium split? Down payment, number and frequency of instalments, instalment fees. |
| Delinquency plan | Account or PolicyPeriod | What happens when a payment is missed? Grace period, reminders, fees, cancellation. |
| Commission plan | Producer code | What commission rate applies and when is it earned and paid? (See module 09.) |
Plans are versioned by effective date, so you can introduce a new payment plan without touching policies already using the old one.
Billing plans
The billing plan is about the rhythm of invoices for an account:
- Invoice day and lead time — e.g. bill on the 5th, due 14 days later.
- Non-responsive / low-balance thresholds — don't send an invoice for tiny amounts; carry them to the next bill.
- Fees — invoice fee, payment reversal fee for bounced payments.
- Disbursement settings — whether credit balances are refunded automatically.
Payment plans
Payment plans are what customers choose when they say "monthly, please". A plan defines:
Down payment
A percentage due up front, often on the first invoice. Can be 0%.
Instalments
Maximum number and frequency (monthly, quarterly), and when the first one falls.
Fees
An instalment fee per invoice item, sometimes waived for some plans.
Overrides per charge
Rules for how mid-term changes and fees are spread: over remaining instalments, or billed at once.
Annual premium 6,000, plan "Quarterly, 25% down". Down payment 1,500 on the first invoice; three instalments of 1,500 each quarter. A mid-term change adding 400 in month 5 is spread over the two remaining instalments: 200 each.
Changing a payment plan mid-term re-plans the remaining invoice items. The customer's earlier payments stay where they are.
Delinquency
When an invoice item is past due and not paid, BillingCenter starts a delinquency process following the delinquency plan. Each step is an event at a number of days after the trigger:
- Day 0Past dueDelinquency starts; grace period begins.
- Day 7Dunning letter 1Reminder sent, maybe with a fee.
- Day 14Dunning letter 2Final notice of intent to cancel.
- Day 21CancelBillingCenter asks PolicyCenter to cancel for non-payment.
- LaterWrite-offRemaining small balance written off or sent to collections.
- Delinquency can be per policy (only the unpaid policy is cancelled) or per account.
- If the customer pays during the process, delinquency exits; if the policy was already cancelled, a reinstatement can be triggered.
- The plan defines thresholds so small unpaid amounts don't trigger delinquency at all.
The timing and wording of dunning and cancellation notices are often governed by local law and insurance contract rules — for example, minimum notice periods before cover can lapse for non-payment. Model the legal minimum first, then add business preferences on top.
The link back to PolicyCenter
The cancellation step doesn't cancel anything inside BillingCenter. It sends a request to PolicyCenter, which starts a cancellation job with source "carrier" and reason "non-payment". When PolicyCenter binds the cancellation, it sends a billing instruction back reversing the unearned premium. If the customer pays before the effective date, BillingCenter can rescind the request.
This round trip is one of the most important integration flows in the suite. You'll see the technical side in module 16.
Designing plans
- Keep the number of payment plans small. Every plan multiplies test cases.
- Decide who can change a policy's payment plan and whether a fee applies.
- Align delinquency timing with letter templates, payment channels and bank processing times — a direct debit can take days to come back as failed.
- Agree which events create activities for staff (e.g. high-value delinquency) and which run silently.