Municipal Software CUBIC 17 Release Updates

CUBIC 17.0 was released to our customers in December 2020. The 17.0 Release is chock full of improvements throughout. You can find all the details in the video and Release Letter below.

The CUBIC v17.0 Release is loaded with new features, improvements, and refinements. These changes have come from the Annual Survey, technology advances, and requests submitted throughout the year. Our goal in updating CUBIC is to keep the product technically state-of-the-art, more efficient, and more pleasing to use. Below are highlights of the major changes and new features found in CUBIC v17.0.

1. Customer Maintenance. There have been numerous enhancements made to Customer Maintenance, they are as follows:

• There is now a column for the customer’s Property Type on all of the sort sequence grids on the command window in Customer Maintenance and the Customer Search except for the Meter Number, Serial Number, and Transponder Number sort sequence grids since those grids are service based instead of customer based.
• There is now the ability to set a Preference for the “Suppress Non-Active Services with No Balance” check box on the Service Information tab.
• An ACH Maximum field has been added to the Automatic Payment tab in Customer Maintenance. The ACH Maximum is the maximum withdrawal amount that can be pulled from the customer’s bank account for an ACH payment. If the customer owes more than the ACH Maximum that is setup on their account, the ACH process will process a payment for the amount of the ACH Maximum and leave the remaining balance on the customer’s account. The ACH Maximum will default to 9,999,999.99 for a customer and cannot have a negative or zero value. The ACH Maximum has also been added to the Customer List and Customer ACH List.
• When performing either the Synchronize Billing Information or Synchronize Owner Information, the customer’s account balance is now included inthe grid listing all the accounts.
• Changes have been made to the Customer Copy. The Unmetered Last Bill Date, Unmetered Serial Number, Last Due Date and Usage History Check boxes have been moved from the Customer Information to Copy area to the Service Information to Copy area. For users who do not have the Meter Maintenance Module, there are new options to Copy, Move or Leave Meter Information and Transponder Information. The “Meter Information” consists of the Meter Number, Serial Number, Meter Install Date, Meter Last Maintenance Date, and Handheld ID. The “Transponder Information” consists of the Handheld Transponder, Transponder Install Date and Transponder Last Maintenance Date.

2. Handheld Upload. There is now the ability to select the handheld file to upload each time an import is processed. To enable the Handheld Import File field on the Upload screen, the new “Prompt User for File to Upload” box needs to be checked in System Controls on the Controls tab under the Handheld Name field. The field on the upload screen will default to the \CUBIC\DATA\Handheld.imp file unless the user has an Alternate Name and/or Alternate Path entered in System Controls. When a different location is entered, the program will copy then entered file to the CUBIC\DATA\handheld.imp file and then perform the upload.

3. Billing Edit List. There have been multiple changes to the Billing Edit List, they are as follows:

• A Rate Code Range option has been added to the Billing Edit List. This has options for Meter, Unmetered, Installment and Deposit rate types along with a Rate Code Range. These new fields are only enabled when the “Unbilled” check box is Unchecked and the new “Service Total Charge Range” is Checked.
• There is now the ability to enter a Usage Range on the Billing Edit List. This option becomes enabled when on the Meter Rate Code check box is selected. If any of the check boxes in the Rate Code Range are selected, the Usage range will not be enabled. When this field is enabled, the program will compare the total usage of the metered service against the usage range entered. If it is not within the range, it will not be included on the report. With the addition of this new range, the “Only Zero Usage Services” check box has been removed. If the user wants to only see services with Zero usage, they would just enter in 0 in both the from and to range.
• There is now the ability to enter in a Charges Range on the Billing Edit List. There are two options for this new feature, Total New Charge Range and Service Total Charge Range. When the Total New Charge Range is selected, the program will compare the entered charge range against the Total New Charges on the bill; this is the total of all services that are billed. When the Service Total Charge Range is selected, the total charges of the service that is billed will be compared against the entered charge range. These new fields are only enabled when the “Unbilled” check box is Unchecked. When the Total New Charge Range is selected, the Rate Code Range, Usage Range and High/Low Range fields will all be disabled.
• An option has been added to the Billing Edit List to return to the report options screen once the report has finished printing.

4. High Usage Notice. In the Previous 12 Usages area on the Notice, the average of the 12 usages now prints at the bottom of the table.

5. Bill Print. The Bill Print has been changed so that if a customer is setup to use Automatic Payments and the amount due on the bill is more than the customer’s ACH Maximum, a comment line on the bill will be populated with “ACH MAXIMUM xxxxxxx.xx” where “xxxxxxx.xx” will be the ACH Maximum amount that is defined for the customer.

6. Send E-bill Notifications. When sending E-Bill Notifications, if the customer is setup to use Automatic Payments and the amount due on the bill is more than the customer’s ACH Maximum and the E-Bill Notifications are setup to include the ACH Comment in the message, an additional comment will be added to the message showing “ACH MAXIMUM xxxxxxx.xx” where “xxxxxxx.xx” will be the ACH Maximum amount that is defined for the customer.

7. Create ACH File. When executing the Create ACH File, if a customer that is having an ACH processed owes more than the ACH Maximum that is setup on their account, the ACH process will process a payment for the amount of the ACH Maximum and leave the remaining balance on the customer’s account. If the user chooses the preview option, any customers that will have their ACH Maximum applied will show a warning indicator next to their ACH Amount in the preview grid to indicate that the ACH maximum will be applied as the ACH payment amount and the amount shown in the preview grid is the ACH maximum amount. An option has also been added to the ACH E-Mail Information window in System Controls to “Include maximum comment in message when customer’s ACH maximum was applied” and a Maximum Comment field has also been added so the user can define what the maximum comment should say in the email. When the ACH E-Mail notifications are sent, if the option to include the maximum comment is turned on and the customer had the ACH maximum applied, the Maximum Comment that the user defined will be included in the e-mail message. Also note that when the ACH maximum is applied, the payment amount that can be shown in the ACH E-Mail notification will be the ACH maximum. The ACH Report that prints after the ACH file has been created has also been changed so that if a customer had their ACH Maximum applied, the line on the report for the customer will include an “** ACH MAXIMUM APPLIED **” indicator. The report from the ACH Archive will also include this indicator.

8. Miscellaneous Billing. Options have been added to Miscellaneous Billing to retain comments and to retain the reference field when entering miscellaneous bills. Also, when adding a Miscellaneous Bill, there is a new option to “Show Bills Entered During This Session” that when selected will display a window below the billing window showing all previous miscellaneous bills entered during the current session.

9. Monthly Billing Report. Customer and transaction counts have been added to the Monthly Billing Report for each period on the report. There is also a grand total for the number of transactions and for the number of distinct customers – an individual customer is only included once in the customer grand total even if the customer was counted in multiple periods on the report.

10. Receipts. A change has been made to the posting of payments into the system for users with the Productivity Module. Now each payment transaction will get a unique “Receipt Number” assigned to it. This includes payments made through Receipt Posting, Simple Batch Posting, Batch Posting, ACH Payments, Miscellaneous Payments, Payment Assistance Payments, Deposits, Lockbox Payments, Internet Inquiry uploads, etc. Each payment that gets entered in the system will get a receipt generated for it. The receipt will look like the physical receipt that may or may not have been printed to the receipt printer. The generated receipt will contain the new unique “Receipt Number”. With this change, the user will now be able to locate this receipt in CUBIC via the Receipt Number. Previously the receipt number that printed on the physical receipt was not stored in the system, and with this change, it is now stored. To accommodate this, changes have been made to the receipt entry programs. There is no longer “Drawer” or “Receipt” buttons on the receipt posting screens. The “Pay Type” will determine if a physical receipt should print and if the drawer will open when the OK button is pressed. The settings for the Pay Types are located in Pay Type Maintenance. In the receipt entry programs, if for some reason a physical receipt did not print or print correctly, there is now a Reprint Last Receipt button that will enable once a payment has been made. Once this button is pressed, a physical receipt for the last payment will print. If the user needs to re-print any other receipts, there is a Receipt History button that brings the user to Receipts History where they can re-print old receipts. For users who use either Batch Receipts or Simple Batch Payments, changes have been made to store the versions of the receipt. Each time that a receipt is edited, a new current version of the receipt will be created. Users will be able to see the version and changes in the new Receipts History program. When a payment is deleted, even though the entry in Batch Receipt or Simple Batch Payments is removed, the Receipt History for that transaction will still exist. An additional record will be added to the Receipt History will get created when the transaction is deleted. This new record will contain the date and time the transaction was deleted along with the user initials of who deleted it. All history transactions will be marked as Deleted. When a payment is either Reversed or NSF’d, the Receipt History transaction will also be marked as Reversed or NSF’d.

11. Receipts History. A new Receipt History program has been created. The program, located off of the “Receipts” menu or on the “Receipts Task Pane”. This program lists all of the receipts that are stored in the Receipt History file. *These are only payments added in the system after the 17.0 version of CUBIC is installed. There is the ability to sort the information in the search grid in Receipt Number, Book/Account, Billing Name and Service Address order along with the ability to sort the grid in Ascending or Descending order. At the bottom of the screen, there are Pay Type Range, Payment Date Range, Payment Amount Range, Receipt Status, Receipt Type and Initials Range options to determine the information that is listed in the grid. There are also Preferences for the Sort Order, Receipt Status and Transaction type. The menu grid lists the Receipt Number, Book, Account, Billing Name, Service Address, Transaction Type, Payment Date, Payment Amount, Change, Pay Type, Initials and the Status. Once the View button is pressed or an item in the grid is double clicked on, a screen will be displayed listing detail of the receipt. The top of the screen displays the main receipt information, below that is a grid that list the Date and Time of the receipt. This grid will list any version of the receipt that may exist. There will only be multiple versions of a receipt if it is edited in Batch Receipts or Simple Batch Payments. The first record in the grid will always be the most current version the receipt. When an item is selected in the grid, the information on the screen will change to show what the receipt looked like at that date and time. To the left of this grid is a grid that shows snapshot of the physical receipt. This gets created regardless whether a physical receipt is printed or not. For users who use Validation Printers, if the receipt was validated, the validation information will show at the bottom of the grid. There is also a “Reprint Receipt” and “Reprint Receipt with Validation” button. When the Reprint Receipt button is pressed, the receipt information for the item selected in the Date and Time grid will be printed to the Receipt Printer. For users who use Validation printers, if the payment was a “Check” pay type and was originally validated, there is the ability to re-print the receipt and then have the validation information print by pressing the Reprint Receipt with Validation button. The button will only be enabled if validation information exists. There are also Next and Previous buttons to take the user to the next or previous receipt.

12. Receipts. The Customer Type, Property Type, and a Shut-Off indicator have been added to the customer information area on the Payment, Write-off, Deposits, NSF Checks, Reversal, Write-off Reversal, Deposit Reversal, NSF Deposit, Payment Assistance Receipts, Payment Assistance Refunds, Payment Assistance Reversals, Payment Assistance Transfers, Miscellaneous Payments screens in Real-Time Cash Receipts. The Shut-Off indicator will only be shown if the customer is marked as Shut-Off on the Billing Information tab in Customer Maintenance.

13. Receipt Posting. Options have been added to Receipt Posting to show the customer’s balance aging and delinquent amount. The Show Balance Aging and Show Delinquent Amount buttons are located next to the Old Balance field on the Receipt Posting Payment screen, Receipt Posting Write-Off screen, Receipt Posting NSF Checks screen, Receipt Posting Reversal screen, and Receipt Posting Write-Off Reversal screen. The Show Balance Aging and Show Delinquent Amount options work the same way that they work in Customer Maintenance.

14. Batch Receipt Posting. Options have been added to Batch Receipts Posting to show the customer’s balance aging and delinquent amount. The Show Balance Aging and Show Delinquent Amount buttons are located next to the Old Balance field on the add, edit, view, and individual delete screens for Payment, Write-off, NSF Checks, Reversal, and Write-off Reversals posting types. The Show Balance Aging and Show Delinquent Amount options work the same way that they work in Customer Maintenance.

15. Simple Batch Payments. Options have been added to Simple Batch Payments to show the customer’s balance aging and delinquent amount. The Show Balance Aging and Show Delinquent Amount buttons are located next to the Old Balance field on the add, edit, view, and individual delete screens. The Show Balance Aging and Show Delinquent Amount options work the same way that they work in Customer Maintenance.

16. Bill/Pay History. When viewing the detail of a Payment, Payment Assistance Receipt or Deposit (entered through receipts), the screen now shows the Receipt Number that was assigned to that payment. Next to Receipt Number field is a View Receipt button. When this button is pressed, it will take the user to the Receipt History Transaction for that receipt.

17. General Ledger Codes. There have been a couple of change to General Ledger Codes, they are as follows:

• An option to Suppress Blank Account Groups has been added to the General Ledger Codes List. The option is defaulted to be selected. When the option is selected, account groups that aren’t used in a general ledger code will not print. If an account group only has one account assigned in the group, both account lines in the group will still print. For example, if the Tax 4 Billing account group has a debit account assigned but no credit account assigned, both the debit account line and credit account line will print on the report. This is to indicate that there is a problem with the setup of the account group since if the account group is being used, both the debit and credit accounts should be used.
• The Validate Accounts Against BUCS function has been changed to have asset accounts that are linked to an account based investment show as an error on the report since those accounts should not be used to post in CUBIC.

18. Expanded Trial Balance. A rate code range with options for Metered, Unmetered, Installment, and Deposit rate code types has been added to the Expanded Trial Balance. The Report Scheduler has also been updated for the new rate code range and options on the Expanded Trial Balance.

19. BUCS Interface. The Interface to BUCS menu item has been changed to now have a Sub Menu that has BUCS Interface and the BUCS Interface Deposit Report options.

20. BUCS Interface Deposit Report. A new BUCS Interface Deposit Report has been created for users who during the BUCS Interface choose to do the “Interface Receipts to BUCS Check Register Deposits”. This report produces a listing of the posting that were used to get the Deposit Amount during the Interface. The report groups the deposit information by BUCS Checking Account and Deposit Number. Under each checking account and deposit number, the program lists the Interface date, Posting Date, Book, Account, Posting Type, Service Type, Service Sequence, Rate Code, Amount and Interface Control Numbers that make up the Deposit Total. There are Checking Account, Deposit Number and Interface Date report options to determine the information that shows on the report. There is also the ability to send this report to Excel. Please note that only interfaces that are posted after the 17.0 version of CUBIC will show on this report. This report is located off of the General – Interface to BUCS menu.

21. Work Order Maintenance. When completing a Move-In Work Order, there is now the ability to enter the Move In Read Date and Move In Reading. Once the work order is completed, if the reading information is entered, the service will have the Last Read Date and Current Reading field updated. Since the work order is updating the service information, the user only gets one chance to enter the reading information when completing the work order. If the work order gets updated before the reading information is entered, the user will NOThave the ability to enter this information in the Work Order. The user will either need to manually change the service or delete and re-add the work order. There is an option in System Controls, on the Work Order tab, to warn the user if move in reading information is not entered when the work order is completed.

22. Generate Shut-Off Work Orders. New options for generating a note for the customer have been added to the Generate Shut-Off Work Orders. There is a new “Generate Shut-Off Work Order Note” check box that when checked will enable options to include the Customer Balance and/or the Shut-off date to the Note along with note alert options for the Customer, Receipts and Billing. There is also the Note Text and Note Type that need to be specified. The defaults for these new options are in System Controls on the Shut-Off Automation screen location off of the Work Orders tab. The default note text is “SHUT-OFF WORK ORDER GENERATED” and the default Note Type is “SHUT-OFF”. If this note type does not exist, the user will need to either add this note type or change the default. After the Note Text is entered, a line will be added to indicate the work order number that was added. Next, if the Shut-Off Work Order Basis is set to “JOB CODE” the program will create one note for the customer. If the Basis is set to “TEMPLATES” and the “ONE FOR EACH SERVICE” option is selected, the program will create a note for each service that is created. A line will be added to each of these notes to indicate the service type, rate code and service sequence of the work order that was added. When the “ONE FOR EACH SERVICE TYPE” is selected, a line will be added that lists the service type of the work order that was created. After this information, the customer balance and shut-off date will be included in the note.

23. Balance Transfer Posting. There have been a couple of changes to Balance Transfer Posting, they are as follows.

• There is now a “Select Destination Services” button above the services grid. When this button is pressed, a screen will be displayed showing other possible services that can be selected. Previously this function was only available by double clicking on an item in the grid.
• There is now the ability to transfer balances to Inactive and Final Bill status services. To accommodate this change, the status of the destination service has been added grids. The program will first look for an active service to apply the balance to, if no service is found it will default to the first service that matches the originating service.

24. Installed Backflow Devices. An ID Change option has been added to Installed Backflow Devices to allow the assigned Company Serial Number for an installed backflow device to be changed. The ID Change option for Installed Backflow Devices has also been added to the customer’s Installed Backflow Devices screen in Customer Maintenance.

25. Multi-Property Maintenance. The Synchronize ACH function in Multi-Property Maintenance has been changed to include the ACH Maximum in the synchronization.

26. Reports.Most of the reports throughout the system that have a Book and Account range have had a Customer Search option added.

We at FREY Municipal Software would like to thank everyone who responded to the CUBIC survey and the beta testing of the product. The ideas and suggestions that we receive from our users are the driving force behind the changes that are implemented into CUBIC_.