What You'll Learn
In this article, you will learn how to use Uptick's Fixed Billing Contracts to set up, bill, and manage recurring monitoring contracts. We will cover:
How to create a monitoring billing contract for a property.
The difference between Per Annual and Per Invoice pricing.
Setting up price increase policies, review dates, and contract finish dates.
Bulk-generating and dispatching recurring invoices.
Best practices for tracking monitoring providers and deactivating canceled contracts.
Why Use Billing Contracts for Monitoring?
Monitoring services (such as alarm connection or dual-path monitoring) are recurring, flat-fee arrangements typically billed on a monthly, quarterly, or annual basis.
In Uptick, monitoring fees are managed through Fixed Billing Contracts. Setting these up as Fixed contracts allows you to:
Automate recurring invoices directly from the platform without needing to create or schedule field tasks.
Keep monitoring revenue cleanly separated from standard maintenance contracts for accurate reporting.
Control automatic or manual annual price increases.
Step 1: Create a Fixed Billing Contract
Billing contracts sit at the property level. Even if a customer has identical terms across multiple sites, each property requires its own dedicated billing contract to ensure accurate invoicing and reporting.
Go to Customer Data > Properties and select the relevant property.
Click on the Billing tab.
In the Billing contracts section, click + Create.
Complete the Schedule details:
Name: Give the contract a descriptive name (e.g., Annual Monitoring Contract).
Billing Type: Select Fixed.
Recurrence: Choose how often you bill the customer (e.g., Monthly, Quarterly, Annual).
Contract Start Date: Set the official start date of the agreement.
First Invoice Date: Enter the date the system should generate the first invoice. (Note: If first-year monitoring was covered in an installation project, set this date to start in Year 2).
Review Date (Optional): Set a date to flag when this contract needs renegotiation or review.
Contract Finish Date (Optional): Leave this blank for an ongoing, rolling contract. Only enter a date if the contract has a strict expiration date; once reached, the contract will automatically become inactive after the final invoice is sent.
Select a Price Increase Policy: This is a mandatory field. Choose from:
No bulk price increases (Recommended if you prefer manual reviews).
Automatically, each year by a fixed percentage.
Manually, by percentage set at the time.
Complete the Billing Card setup: Ensure a valid billing card is connected to the property, client, or overridden on this contract, as recurring invoices cannot be generated without one.
Step 2: Add Monitoring Line Items
Under the line items section, you will define the service products and charge structures.
Add your monitoring product from your catalogue (e.g., Alarm Monitoring Fee).
Write a clear description of what will show on the customer's invoice.
Select the Price Period / Type:
Per Annual: Uptick treats the unit price as the yearly total and splits it evenly across your recurrence schedule. For example, a $1,200 annual price with Quarterly recurrence will automatically charge $300 per invoice. This is highly recommended for monitoring contracts to keep cash flow and invoices consistent.
Per Invoice: Uptick charges the full unit price on every invoice generated. For example, a $1,200 price with Quarterly recurrence will charge $1,200 on every invoice ($4,800/year).
Click Create Billing Contract.
Step 3: Generate and Process Invoices
Once your contracts are set up, your accounts team can easily process recurring invoices at the end of each billing cycle (e.g., monthly).
Go to Billing > Billing Contracts in the main navigation menu.
Click the Quick filters dropdown and select Due for invoicing (this month).
Select the contracts you wish to process.
Click Edit [X] Billing contracts.
Under Bulk Process Options, choose your process style:
Process: Create tasks and draft invoices (Recommended): Generates the billing task and a draft invoice for your manual review before dispatching.
Process: Create tasks and send invoices: Generates and automatically emails the invoice to the customer, while syncing it to your accounting software (e.g., Xero). Only use this once your billing data has been fully verified.
Click Apply Changes.
Best Practices & Tips
1. Recording the Monitoring Station
Create an extra field on your billing contracts or properties called "Monitoring Station".
2. Recording the Monitoring Account Number
Create an extra field on billing contracts for the unique monitoring account number - this way it is easy to confirm the ID of the contract with the monitoring station or customer if needed.
3. Monitoring Profitability Tracking
If you receive a consolidated bulk bill from your monitoring provider, it can be hard to track individual site profitability in Uptick.
Workaround: Set up a specific nominal/revenue code in your accounting package (like Xero or Sage) specifically for monitoring. Map your Uptick monitoring billing line items to this code, and log your bulk supplier monitoring bills against the same code to run quick P&L comparisons.
4. How to Cancel or Deactivate a Monitoring Contract
If a customer cancels their monitoring services, you must manually deactivate the contract so future automated invoices stop generating.
Go to Billing > Billing Contracts.
Find the relevant contract and check the box next to it.
Click Edit [X] Billing contracts.
Under Bulk Process Options, select Make Inactive.
Click Apply Changes.
To view your canceled or inactive contracts at any time, go to the Billing Contracts list, click Add Filter, and set Active > No. \