Glossary of Terms
Account
An Account is used to define one of your end-customers, and contains the end-customer name and contact details.
Account Plan
When you attach a priced Plan to an Account, this creates a link between them to create an Account Plan. Attaching priced Plans to an Account determines the charges incurred by customers who are put on the Plan when they consume one of your Products.
Account Plan Group
When you attach a Plan Group to an end customer Account, this creates a link between them to create an Account Plan Group. Attaching a Plan Group to an Account implicitly attaches all of the Plans included in the Group to the Account, and the Account is charged in accordance with those Plans.
Aggregation
An Aggregation specifies how to transform into a single number all of the individual measurements submitted to a Meter data field as usage data. For example, you may choose to simply SUM the values of a data field in the submitted usage data. These single number measurements can then be used as pricing metrics for your products and services and for calculating bills against the customer Accounts that consume those products and services.
Balance
You create Balances for end customer Accounts, which act as credit or debit amounts for your customers. A customer can then draw down against any Balance credit amount for charges incurred throughout the period the Balance has been defined as active for the Account. You can include options to top-up the original Balance.
Bill
A Bill is generated for an Account based on the usage-based pricing Plan that has been attached to the Account.
Child Account
A Child Account is an Account that has a Parent Account defined. You can create Child Accounts for cases where your Organization has customers with multiple Accounts and instead of issuing multiple bills to these customers, you want to provide them with single Bill for the Parent account.
Compound Aggregation
A Compound Aggregation allows you to define an aggregation that is based on other (simple) Aggregations using a mathematical expression. For example, you may choose to multiply the result of two Aggregations together, or choose the maximum value of them, and so on. You can also reference default Custom Fields - those defined at Organizational level - in your Compound Aggregation calculation.
Contract
Create a Contract for an Account if you expect to have end customers who consume several different service or product packages you offer. You can then report for your accounting purpose the total Contract values for these end-customer Accounts.
Counter
Counters in m3ter enable you to quickly implement a wide-range of unit-based pricing models for recurring subscription charges on your products. These types of pricing models require a quantity or number of units as the pricing metric and enable you to charge end-customers based on the numbers of product units, seats, or user licenses they subscribe to within a given billing period.
Counter Adjustment
Create Counter Adjustments for end-customer Accounts using Counters to ensure the Account is billed according to the number of Counter units the Account subscribes to in a given billing period.
See: Understanding and Creating Counter Adjustments for Accounts
Counter Pricing
Create a Counter Pricing for a Product Plan or Plan Template using a Counter, and define a unit-based pricing structure for charging end-customer Accounts put on the Plan for consuming the Product.
Credits
Credit Reasons are defined for an Organization. For Bill adjustments, Credit Reasons are then used to add Credits for an existing bill line item or apply a product Credit manually to a Bill.
See: Creating Credit Reasons and Adding Credit Line Items to Bills
Custom Fields
Custom Fields allow you to attach custom data to some m3ter entities. You can add Custom Fields to define default custom string or number values at the level of your Organization for Products, Plan Templates, Plans, Accounts, Account Plans, or Meters. You can also add Custom Fields to define custom string and number values at the level of the individual Product, Plan Template, Plan, Account, Account Plan, or Meter. The custom values you define at the individual-entity level override the values you’ve defined at the Organizational level.
Data Explorer
The Data Explorer allows you to query the data collected for your Organization in the m3ter platform for Usage, Billing, and Prepayments/Commitments data. You can review the data returned for submitted queries in various formats, including Data Tables or Pivot Tables.
Data Field
A Data Field is configured for a Meter and defines a raw usage data collection field.
Debits
Debit Reasons are defined for an Organization. For Bill adjustments, Debit Reasons are then used to add Debits for an existing bill line item or apply a product Debit manually to a Bill.
See: Creating Debit Reasons and Adding Debit Line Items to Bills
Derived Field
A Derived Field is configured for a Meter and uses a calculation on other fields to determine a usage data field. The calculation for a Derived Field can reference Meter Data Fields, Custom Fields, and system Timestamp fields.
Events
You can use Events generated in m3ter as the basis for setting up and sending Notifications into your external systems when those Events occur and the specific conditions you've defined for triggering a Notification are satisifed.
External Mapping
An External Mapping is a mapping reference. It is a configuration object that allows you to store unique ids for matched objects (such as your end Customer id matched to an Account id in m3ter) across two or more systems. An External Mapping can then be used as a reference lookup for which objects are matched across systems.
Global Meter
A Global Meter does not belong to a specific Product. This allows you to set up usage-based pricing across different Products on the basis of the usage data a single Global Meter collects.
Meter
A Meter defines the data fields that your system will submit to the m3ter platform as usage data. You can create Product-specific Meters or Global Meters. Global Meters are not tied to a specific Product.
Notifications
You can set up Notifications to be triggered and sent into external systems on the basis of m3ter-generated Events. This includes the capability to create rule sets to define the precise conditions under which a Notification will be triggered and sent out when a specific Event occurs.
Organization
An Organization represents your company as a direct customer of the m3ter platform.
Permission Policy
A Permission Policy allows you to control what users in your Organization who have authenticated with the platform are allowed to do.
See: Managing your Users
Plan
A Plan represents a pricing plan for one of your products or services. A Plan is always derived from a Plan Template and inherits settings from the Plan Template only some of which can be overridden.
Plan Group
A Plan Group allows you to include Plans for different Products in the Group and define a minimum spend for the Group. This means you can apply a cross-product minimum spend straightforwardly, which is a very useful capability for certain billing use-case.
Plan Template
A Plan Template allows you to configure default settings for your pricing Plans. These settings control billing operations and the pricing structure you want to apply to your products. Plan Templates avoid repetition in configuration work - many Plans will share settings for billing operations and differ only in the details of their pricing structures.
Prepayment
A Prepayment/Commitment allows you to assign an amount to a customer Account that the customer has agreed to pay over the duration of their contract with you to consume one or more of your products or services. The Prepayment amount is understood as payable regardless of the actual usage the customer becomes liable to pay for during the contract period. A Prepayment contrasts with a simple agreed minimum spend amount defined for an Account, since this will be assessed on a bill-by-bill basis whereas a Prepayment spans across multiple bills and is for the entire contract period. When setting up a Prepayment on an Account, you can include a surcharge rate to be applied for any overage on the Prepayment amount that occurs during the contract period.
Pricing
Pricing allows you to configure the cost of usage data under a specific Plan you apply to an Account, and is used to calculate bills.
Product
A Product represents a product or service that your Organization offers to your end customers. A Meter, Aggregation, Plan Template, Plan, or Pricing typically all belong to a Product. Global Meters and Aggregations can be created, which do not belong to a specific Product.
See: Creating and Managing Products
Segmented Aggregations
Segmented Aggregations allow you to segment the usage data collected by a single Meter and price your Product Plans by these segment values. This capability is very useful for implementing some pricing and billing use cases.
Service User
A Service User represents automated processes that you want to grant direct API access to your Organization. Service Users are used for integrating 3rd-party systems with the m3ter platform.
Statement
Statements are used to accompany the Bills sent out to end customers as backing sheets to invoices. Bill Statements can provide a useful and welcome breakdown of the usage responsible for the usage charge line items your customers see on their invoices.
Transactions
Transaction Types are defined for an Organization. Transaction Types are then used to create specific Transaction amounts for Balances on end-customer Accounts. In this way, Transaction are used to flexibly manage Balance amounts on end-customer Accounts, with a Transaction ledger being maintained for individual Balances.
See: Creating Transaction Types and Creating Transactions for Balances
User
A User represents a person you allow to authenticate with and have access to your Organization in the m3ter platform.