vodafone bill manager · vodafone bill manager – user guide v1 15/12/2011 c1 unclassified page 4...

Vodafone Bill Manager

End User Guide

Vodafone Bill Manager – User Guide v1 15/12/2011

C1 UNCLASSIFIED of 23

Table of Contents

1. Introduction ......................................................................................................................................................... 4

1.1 Login and Launch..................................................................................................................................................... 4

1.2 Help ................................................................................................................................................................................ 5

1.3 Browsers and screen resolution ........................................................................................................................ 5

2. Quick Start Guide ............................................................................................................................................... 6

2.1 Dashboard ................................................................................................................................................................... 6

2.2 Usage Summary ....................................................................................................................................................... 7

2.2.1 View Itemised Call Details ......................................................................................................................................... 8

2.3 Invoice Summary ..................................................................................................................................................... 9

2.4 Observations ........................................................................................................................................................... 10

2.5 Watch points ............................................................................................................................................................ 10

2.6 Users with more than one phone number ................................................................................................. 10

2.7 Users who pay their own invoice .................................................................................................................... 11

3. Electronic Invoice ........................................................................................................................................... 11

4. Usage Tagging ................................................................................................................................................. 12

4.1 Tagging Overview .................................................................................................................................................. 12

4.2 Tagging Administration Process ..................................................................................................................... 12

4.3 Usage Tagging ........................................................................................................................................................ 13

4.3.1 Tagging your calls as Personal ........................................................................................................................... 13

4.3.2 Adding Personalised description ....................................................................................................................... 14

4.4 Tagging Reports..................................................................................................................................................... 14

4.4.1 Business Usage ............................................................................................................................................................. 14

4.4.2 Personal Usage ............................................................................................................................................................. 14

4.4.3 All Usage ........................................................................................................................................................................... 14

4.4.4 My Reports ...................................................................................................................................................................... 15

5. Advanced Reporting Features ................................................................................................................... 16

5.1 Trends......................................................................................................................................................................... 16

5.2 Reports ...................................................................................................................................................................... 17

5.2.1 Report Functionality .................................................................................................................................................. 18

5.2.2 Cost Summary............................................................................................................................................................... 19

5.2.3 Cost Range ...................................................................................................................................................................... 19

5.2.4 Usage Summary ........................................................................................................................................................... 19



5.2.5 Billing Period................................................................................................................................................................... 19

5.2.6 Peak/Off peak ............................................................................................................................................................... 19

5.2.7 Daily Distribution ......................................................................................................................................................... 20

5.2.8 Duration range .............................................................................................................................................................. 20

5.2.9 Usage Type ...................................................................................................................................................................... 20

5.2.10 Roamed Usage.............................................................................................................................................................. 20

5.2.11 Transmission Summary ........................................................................................................................................... 21

5.2.12 Bundle Usage ................................................................................................................................................................. 21

5.3 My Reports ............................................................................................................................................................... 21

5.3.1 Scheduled Reports ..................................................................................................................................................... 21

5.3.2 Creating customised Call reports ..................................................................................................................... 22

5.3.3 Creating customized Charge reports ............................................................................................................. 22

5.4 File Exports ............................................................................................................................................................... 23

5.4.1 Usage Download ......................................................................................................................................................... 23

5.4.2 Phone Summary ............................................................................................................................................ 23



1. Introduction

Vodafone Bill Manager (VBM) is an online billing service within Vodafone Corporate Online (VCO). VBM lets you see your

mobile phone spend and your itemised usage. If you pay your own invoice, you can also print and download your

electronic bill.

VBM is a feature rich reporting and analytics service offering with a wide range of reports, so you can analyse your calls,

data use, roaming calls, messaging and mobile content purchases.

VBM also lets you tag the numbers you call to identify if the call is a personal or business call. You can then generate

reports showing just your personal or business usage. Note: this feature is dependent on the company profile settings,

so not all users will see these menu options.

1.1 Login and Launch

Your account is set up by your customer administrator. You’ll need a VCO username and password to access the service.

They’ll set up your VBM account which will create a VCO username (this will be your email address), and a temporary

password.

To launch VBM, simply use your email address to log in to Vodafone Corporate Online www.vcol.co.uk. The first time

you login you’ll be asked to enter the temporary password which you received by email, then select a new password.

When you login you’ll land on the Vodafone Corporate Online page. From here select Online Billing on the main menu,

then ‘Launch VBM’. This will take you to the VBM Dashboard which is the main landing page for VBM.

If you need more assistance with access to Vodafone Corporate online, please refer to Vodafone Corporate online help.

http://www.vcol.co.uk/



1.2 Help

Vodafone Bill Manager help can be found under the ‘Help’ tab above the main Vodafone Menu bar. Additionally,

throughout the site you’ll see the red question mark icon. Selecting the help icon will display help information relevant

to the page or portlet you are currently viewing.

1.3 Browsers and screen resolution

Great care has been taken to optimise this service across all browsers; however, advance functionality which is required

to make the service function relies on established web standards which some older browsers do not support fully. As a

result, some users may encounter problems using older applications.

VBM supports IE 6, 7 & 8 and Firefox 3.6.

Vodafone Bill Manager is optimised for screen resolution 1280 *1024.



2. Quick Start Guide

When you launch VBM you’ll be taken to the Dashboard. This provides a single snapshot of your bill, making it simple to

see your usage and charges.

2.1 Dashboard

At the top of the dashboard is the main menu bar where you can access; Trends, Reports, Usage tagging, File exports or

return to Vodafone Corporate Online. Note: Changing your password and personal account details can be done via

Vodafone Corporate Online – My account.

Above the VBM main menu bar, you’ll find a Help tab, here; you can download the user guide and see answers to

frequently asked questions.

By default VBM will display the most current billing period but you can switch to other months by changing the Billing

Period at the top of the page. The rest of the dashboard is split into 4 areas; Usage summary, Invoice summary,

Observations and Watchpoints, see figure 1, VBM Dashboard.

Figure 1. Vodafone Bill Manager Dashboard.

£ 62.44

£ 64.76

£ 73.98



2.2 Usage Summary

On the ‘Dashboard’ you will see the ‘Usage summary’ portlet. This shows a summary of your usage and usage charges. It

shows the total usage charge, duration, number of calls, messages and purchases, data volume and amount of phone

numbers.

When you roll over each of the six usage headings, the graph on the right will change to show you a comparison of the

current and previous invoices. The arrows next to the data show increases or decreases from the previous billing period. If

you hover over the arrows, the previous invoice amount will be displayed.

A link is also available within this portlet – taking you to a detailed usage summary report. The usage summary report will

show summary information, but can be drilled down to show call itemisation. For further details see section 2.1.1 View

Itemised Call Details.

Note that the ‘Usage charge’ shown on the dashboard is the amount charged on your invoice, whereas ‘usage costs’

shown in the usage summary report are the pre-rounded values.



2.2.1 View Itemised Call Details

You can access call Itemisation either from the ‘Dashboard-Usage Summary Portlet’ by selecting the hyperlink “View

Usage summary report” or from the ‘Reports Menu’ then selecting the “Usage summary report” listed under the ‘Costs’

heading.

The “Usage summary” report breaks down the total usage costs for a phone number. First you will see a summary

showing; Number of calls, Messages and purchases, Duration, Data volume, and Cost.

To view the detail, click on the magnifying glass icon next to the phone number. This will open a new window. To view

all your itemisation for the selected billing period, select the ‘View detail’ button. This will show the call itemisation listed

in cost descending order. You can change which column the report sorts on, e.g. change to date order, by clicking on the

red arrow icon at the top of each column heading,

This report can be emailed, downloaded, scheduled or printed using the four icons at the top right of the portlet.

Email – When you select the email icon, you can select the format you want the report to be emailed in, e.g. CSV,

Excel, PDF etc. Click the preferred option then select ‘Email report’.

Save – When you select the save icon, you can select the format you want to download the report in, e.g. CSV,

Excel, PDF etc. Click the preferred option then select ‘Download report’.

Schedule Report - This feature is a great way of automating this report so it is automatically created, every billing

period. As soon as a new bill is loaded on VBM, scheduled reports will automatically be emailed to your email address

without you needing to login to VBM. When you select the schedule icon, you can select the format of the report, e.g.

CSV, Excel, PDF etc. Then you can choose if the report is to be emailed just to you or to additional contacts. To add

contacts (other than you), select manage contacts and add the email address or email group. Then when you’re

finished, click on the “Schedule report” button.

Print - When you select the print icon, it will ask to display the print preview page where you can choose to print

selected pages of the report.

If you only want to view part of your itemised call report you can amend the reporting criteria or presentation criteria.

Reporting Criteria - This option enables you to edit the reporting criteria, for example to select a specific time period

or to alter the way the data is sorted.

‘Presentation criteria’ – This option enables you to adjust the way results are displayed. You can choose to group your

data by a range of criteria (e.g. Date, User name, Dialled number etc.) and/or order it in a particular way (e.g. by

Volume, Duration, Cost etc.). Results can also be limited, so only a selection of the results is shown e.g. the top 50

calls by cost.



2.3 Invoice Summary

On the ‘Dashboard’ you will see the ‘Invoice summary’ portlet, this shows the total charge (ex VAT), plus a breakdown of

usage charges (as shown in the Usage summary) plus recurring monthly charges and any other one-off charges.

The dashboard shows the last three billing periods. However, selecting ‘See all invoices’ will expand the view to show up

to 13 months. Underneath the invoice table is a graph which shows you comparative information across billing periods.

To change the view criteria of the graph use the drop-down box. If the graphs are not visible then click ‘Show chart’ to see

a graphical view of the invoice breakdown.

If you have appropriate access rights to view invoices then there will be a ‘Details’ link next to the invoice. By clicking the

‘details’ link you will be presented with a breakdown for each invoice and a PDF icon where you can view the

electronic invoice.

When you click on the PDF icon, a new window opens showing the electronic invoice. The electronic invoice can be

viewed, searched, printed and downloaded. You can navigate to specific sections or phone numbers of the invoice using

‘Go to’. You can choose to print and download the full invoice, page ranges or current page.



2.4 Observations

Observations are key changes on your invoice highlighting averages and changes in your usage and charges. To view all

observations click ’See all observations’. Observations are system defined.

The observations are grouped into general observations shown by exclamation marks , or increase/decreases shown

by the red and green arrow icons . All observations are comparative to the previous month. Use the ‘details’ link to

quickly go to the relevant report to view more detailed information.

2.5 Watch points

‘Watch points’ let you to keep track of up to five specific telephone numbers, perhaps your most frequently dialled,

personal numbers or those relating to a particular job or client. To set up which numbers you wish to keep track of, click

the ‘Edit’ button and enter your chosen dialled numbers - you can enter up to 5.

2.6 Users with more than one phone number

If you have more than one phone number you will see a ‘Find’ and ‘Reporting structure’ tab at the top of the dashboard.

To view billing data for one number, enter the phone number in the ‘Find’ box and click on it. The dashboard will now

show information relevant to this number.

If you don’t remember the number or you want to see all the numbers available to you to view, select ‘Reporting

structure’. You will then see then see ‘My phone numbers’ in the current selection. Click on the red arrow next to ‘My

numbers’, this will expand the view to show the full list of phone numbers. Then simply click on one to view billing

information for this phone number.

If you don’t select a number, the ‘Dashboard’ will show the total charges and usage of all your phone numbers. At the top

the page it will confirm the number you are viewing.



2.7 Users who pay their own invoice

The ‘Dashboard’ will show the total charges and usage of all your phone numbers. You can see the number of phones on

the invoice on the Usage Summary portlet ‘phone numbers’.

If you pay your own invoice you will see a ‘Find’ and ‘Reporting structure’ tab at the top of the dashboard. To view billing

information for just one number you can enter the phone number in the ‘Find’ box and click on it. The dashboard will now

show information relevant to this number.

If you don’t remember the number or you want to see all the numbers available to you to view, select ‘Reporting

Structure’. You will then see the billing account number in the current selection. Click on the red arrow next to your

account to expand the view.

Depending how your account has been set up, you may need to continue expanding the structure, until you see the

phone numbers. When you see the phone numbers, simply click on one to view billing information for this phone

number. At the top of the page you will see confirmation of the number you are viewing.

3. Electronic Invoice

Vodafone Bill Manager provides users with appropriate access rights, with the ability to view, print and download their

invoices online. The electronic invoice is in PDF format and is an identical copy of paper invoices.

Invoices can be printed from the ‘Invoice summary portlet’ on the dashboard or more simply by clicking ’Invoices’ on the

main VBM menu bar.

The search box enables you to search by invoice number or by billing account (BAN/BEN). To view an invoice, click on

the PDF icon next to the invoice. This will open a new window displaying your invoice. On top menu bar, you can

use the green forward/backward arrows to navigate through the pages. The ‘Go to’ icon allows you to go to a particular

page or search for a particular CTN (or phone number).

The magnifying glass icon enables you to find information. Invoices can be downloaded or printed as a whole or as

individual pages or page ranges. Large documents can be compressed (zip).

Note: whilst VBM reports only supports itemisation for the 3 most recent months, if your invoice contains call

itemisation, this can be viewed for up to 13 months of history.



4. Usage Tagging

4.1 Tagging Overview

Your company administrator can give you access to the Usage tagging feature, so that you can view your mobile usage

and tag your calls to indicate if the call was business or personal use. Call tagging is a simple way of splitting your bill into

business and personal usage. The Business usage report and Personal usage reports can then be used as part of your

company procedures to pay/reclaim personal call cost or business call costs. For further details, refer to your company

procedures.

Usage Tagging is accessed from the main menu, clicking on this takes you to the ‘Usage tagging overview’ page, where

you can define your tags and access the split usage reports.

4.2 Tagging Administration Process

VBM call tagging allows end users to;

Tag dialled numbers and individual calls as personal.

Submit tagging to lock tags for the current billing period

Save personal tags so they are applied to future billing periods

Produce reports split by personal or business use

This portlet is split into three sections:

Tagging

Business/Personal usage reports

My reports – Create a bespoke report based on usage charge information.



4.3 Usage Tagging

4.3.1 Tagging your calls as Personal

Usage tagging allows you to identify and tag any personal calls you have made in the current billing month. You can tag

individual calls or all calls to a particular number.

On the usage tagging menu, you will see a complete list of all the numbers that you’ve dialled. To tag a number as

personal click on the circle next to the dialled number , once clicked the circle will change to a red circle

with a cross , this fully tags a number and this number will continue to be tagged as personal in all future months via

learned tagging.

To tag an individual call, click drill down on the magnifying glass next to the dialled number. You’ll then see the

individual calls made to this number. To tag a call as personal, click on the circle next to the individual call, This number

on the overview page will be shown as partially tagged, with the circle showing as a single line . Partially

tagged numbers will not be remembered next month.

If there are multiple pages of numbers, you can save the tags on each page. Or when you are finished select the ‘save all

tagging’ button, which saves all your changes.

When you’ve completed all your personal tags for the current invoice period, click on the ‘Submit’ tagging button. You'll

then be asked to confirm. This will lock your tags so you can no longer edit them. Once locked the tagging icons will be

replaced with a padlock icon and a message displayed to say “Your tagging has been locked for this bill. Calls were

submitted on DD/MMM/YYYY HH:MM:SS”. The detailed drill down will still be available when your statement is locked,

but the tagging icons will show the padlock icon as well and no changes can be made.

Your administrator will be able to see if you’ve viewed your billing information and whether you’ve submitted your tags.

Administrators can send you reminders to submit or lock your account if you haven’t submitted your tags.

If for any reason you need to unlock this bill so that the tagging can be updated, you’ll need to contact your company

administrator who’ll be able to unlock it for you. If an administrator locks a message “locked by Administrator” will be

shown on the Users Usage Tagging screen,

Please note that even if your statement is locked, you can continue to alter the description of a dialled number

description and mark it as being personal in the future. You’ll also still be able to drill down to your individual usage

records.

All submitted fully tagged numbers will apply to future invoices, unless the user untags this number or partially tags it.



4.3.2 Adding Personalised description

To help you analyse your billing information you can choose to personalise the descriptions of the dialled numbers. This

can be for any dialled number, business or personal. Personalised descriptions only apply to your invoice and do not

affect tagging. Personal descriptions will apply to future invoices.

To add a personal description, click on next to the dialled number. This will show a new window with a text box

where you can add your description. You can also choose one of the icons which will be displayed with the description.

The ‘Revert to original entry’ tick box removes your personal description and reverts to system description. Any

personalised descriptions can be hidden from usage reports.

Access to personalised descriptions is available on several reports in VBM, including Business usage report and Personal

usage report.

Please note, if an Admin user (assigned to the top level of the company structure) enters a description, you will see this

amended description. But you can change this if required and also hide this description on exported reports. You can also

reset the changed description back to the original description, however please note sorting is based on the original

description not the user defined description.

4.4 Tagging Reports

4.4.1 Business Usage

This report shows all the calls that you have left untagged i.e. Business, in the 'Usage tagging' page. This report is read

only and no changes to the tagged status can be made. However, you can print, email and download in a number of

formats. If the report is emailed or downloaded, any personal dialled number descriptions will be replaced with the

original description

4.4.2 Personal Usage

This report shows all the calls that you have tagged i.e. personal. This report is read only and no changes to the tagged

status can be made. However, you can print, email and download in a number of formats. If the report is emailed or

downloaded, any personal dialled number descriptions will be replaced with the original description.

4.4.3 All Usage

This report shows all the calls that you have made with both tagged and untagged usage together. This report is read

only and no changes to the tagged status can be made.



If supplied in the data, two additional fields will be available: ‘Tax cost’ and ‘Tax exempt cost’. These will indicate if the call

included tax or tax was exempt. This is purely for reference and no tax calculations are done.

You can print, email and download in a number of formats. If the report is emailed or downloaded, any personal dialled

number descriptions will be replaced with the original description.

4.4.4 My Reports

The ‘My reports’ functionality is accessible from the Usage tagging menu and offers some additional options to that in

the main reports area; see section 5.3



5. Advanced Reporting Features

The quick start section shows you the main features of Vodafone Bill Manager, how to download your invoice and how to

view your itemised calls. Vodafone Bill manager offers many more advanced features to enable you to understand your

phone charges in much more detail. This section describes the full set of reports and trend analysis you can do when you

have access to the site.

5.1 Trends

The Trends menu allows you to view graphical reports showing usage information that you can compare across historical

billing periods.



A number of pre-defined charts are available, which can be selected using the ‘Category’ drop-down menu. These

categories allow you to select a particular type of usage e.g. ‘calls while in the UK’. Data can be further filtered using

options within the ‘View by’ dropdown, showing number of calls, duration, messages, data volume and cost.

You’ll see two charts, so you’re able to compare one set of data with another.

The icons to the right of the chart allow you to change its format. The icons, from the top, allow you to choose from: bar

chart, line chart or area chart. Clicking the bottom icon will print your chart.

To create a new chart, click the ‘Create a new trend chart’ button.

You’ll then be given a range of variables and options to select from. Start by creating a name for your chart, and then

select your desired Format, Axis, Category and View. You can use the two axes (axis 1 and axis 2) to compare one

category against another. Once you’ve entered the relevant information, click on the “Save as a new trend chart” button.

Once you’ve saved your new chart it will show under ‘My trend charts’ in the drop-down menu you viewed earlier. To go

back and view your charts select ‘Return to trend overview’.

5.2 Reports

The Reports menu gives you access to a range of predefined reports grouped into ‘Costs’, ‘When’, ‘Where’, and ‘How’.

Additionally, you can customise your own reports in the ‘My reports’ section.

Any report can be run on any individual phone number. Select the phone numbers then choose one of the reports by

clicking on it. Once a report has been selected and viewed you can either return to the 'Overview' page or alternatively

select another report via the drop down menu on each group.

The majority of reports initially summarise data, which can then be further interrogated by 'drilling' down to the

usage/charge details screen. All reports display information in text; some reports can also be displayed graphically.



5.2.1 Report Functionality

Unless specifically stated within each report help text, all reports share the same functionality; this includes:

‘Select detail’ icon . This drills down into the data to view the actual usage/charges and you’ll be taken to the

“Summary of search results” screen. From here, click the “View detail” button to see the available records. Please

note, if this returns too many results this button will not be available and you must refine your search.

'Print' preview - Lets you preview and then print your selected report.

‘Email’ – Lets you email the report you are viewing in a number of formats.

‘Save’ – Enables you to download and save the report you are viewing in a number of formats.

‘Schedule report’ – Allows you to set up the report you are viewing so that it runs automatically each month

and is sent via email to you. You can also add a list of email addresses or distribution groups that the email can be

sent to.

Most reports will show data in a table format with data in cost descending order. Reports can be run in any billing period.

To alter the billing period you’re viewing select a new period at the top of the page. It’s possible to drill down from all

reports to see more detailed information by clicking on the magnifying glass “Select detail’ icon . To view the detail,

select ‘View Details’ this will show all itemisation up to a maximum of 10,000 rows. To be more selective you can amend

the reporting criteria or presentation criteria.

Reporting Criteria - This shows the filters applied to your report, and provides the option to edit the criteria for

example to select a specific time period or to alter the way the data is sorted.

‘Presentation criteria’ gives you the option to refine your reports further by adjusting the way results are displayed,

with the data ordered in the way most relevant to you. You can choose to group your data by a range of criteria (e.g.

Date, User name, Dialled number etc.) and/or order it in a particular way (e.g. by Volume, Duration, Cost etc.). Results

can also be limited, so only a selection of the results is shown. Using ‘Presentation criteria’, a report that returns 200

call records could be refined so only the top 50 records (by value) are shown, grouped by area code.



5.2.2 Cost Summary

The Cost summary report breaks down the total billing costs for each phone number. The following columns are shown:

‘Recurring charges’, ‘Usage charges’, ‘Other charges’, ‘Recurring credits’, ‘Usage credits’, ‘Other credits’, ‘Total (ex VAT)’.

The report can be saved and emailed in the formats detailed in the reports overview, but no graph is available.

5.2.3 Cost Range

The Cost range report splits the usages into cost ranges e.g. from £0.001 to £0.250. The report displays the Number of

calls, Duration, Messages and purchases, Data volume and Cost of usage records falling within each cost range to show if

calls are typically high or low cost per call.

This report is ideal for identifying if the majority of calls are of high or low cost, potentially highlighting where call costs

could be reduced. You can drill-down to see more details by clicking on the magnifying glass.

A graph is available showing the cost ranges.

5.2.4 Usage Summary

The Usage summary report breaks down the total usage costs for each phone number. For each phone number you can

see; Number of calls, Message and purchases, Duration, Data volume, and Cost. You can drill down to see the list of

itemised usage records.

5.2.5 Billing Period

The Billing period report details usage (e.g. calls made, texts sent etc) for each calendar day within a billing period. The

user can select a drill-down on a particular day and see the itemised list of calls made through that day (24 hours). By

default, the data is ordered in cost descending order, but data can also be ordered by any of the columns, e.g. date, by

clicking on the red arrow under the column headings.

5.2.6 Peak/Off peak

The Peak/off-peak report shows you the number of calls that have been made, during each of the following time periods:

‘Peak’, ‘Weekend’, ‘Off-peak’, and ‘Not applicable’ for any calls that don’t confirm to these groupings e.g. GPRS data.

The time periods are defined by the following:

Peak: 08:00:00 – 18:59:59 Monday – Friday

Off-peak: 00:00:00 – 07:59:59 and 19:00:00 – 23:59:59 Monday – Friday

Weekend: 00:00:00 Saturday – 23:59:59 Sunday

Bank holidays are not taken into account.

Indication arrows to the right of each line item will highlight changes in the cost of usage from the previous month.



Graphs are available, showing the data in a graphical format (e.g. pie or bar charts).

5.2.7 Daily Distribution

The Daily distribution report presents all usage based on time of day. Usage is grouped in hourly time-slots; showing you

how many calls were made throughout the 24 hours in the day. This shows you when the busiest time is and whether

calls are made outside normal office times.

Due to the way Vodafone aggregate GPRS usage consumed in a 24 hour period, all usage is shown with a timestamp of

00:00:00. This does not indicate that any users were transferring data at midnight, it’s simply a generic timestamp given

to all data usage.

Selecting the ‘Detail’ magnifying glass icon allows you to view a detailed report on that hour, and edit the reporting

criteria to filter and group the data presented.

5.2.8 Duration range

The Duration range report shows all usage based on the length of the call. Usage is grouped into duration ranges (i.e. 1 –

30 seconds; 31 seconds to 1 minute; etc). This report identifies the typical length of calls, e.g. if most calls are short or

long.

The report will also separate out usage items that are not charged by duration (such as GPRS data or SMS, for example).

By default the report is sorted in cost descending order, however, using the red arrows under each column heading the

report can be sorted using other criteria, e.g. duration range.

Usage arrows will be shown, indicating changes in the volume of calls within each duration range.

5.2.9 Usage Type

The Usage type report shows you all usage billed in the chosen billing period against the selected company structure,

separated into different ‘usage type’ categories (e.g. ‘Calls while in the UK’, ‘Messaging while in the UK’, ‘Roamed calls’

etc). It’s a particularly useful report for analysing the most common types of usage, and their relative costs.

By default the report is sorted in relation to the number of calls, with the category showing the highest usage listed at

the top. However, the information can also be ordered by clicking on the red arrow underneath each of the column

headings: Usage type, Duration, Messages and purchases, Data volume or Cost.

5.2.10 Roamed Usage

The Roamed usage report provides the opportunity to quickly see usage within your nominated company structure

during the billing period, which has been incurred while users were roaming abroad.

Roaming usage is separated into a variety of categories (e.g. Roamed SMS, Roamed incoming calls, Roamed outgoing

calls) and this can be compared with all other usage (listed as ‘Not roamed’ usage).



The data is sorted, by default, according to the number of instances of each type of usage (‘Number of calls’). However, it

can also be sorted by clicking on the red arrow underneath any of the other column headings (Usage type, Duration,

Messages and purchases, Data volume or Cost). Indication arrows next to each usage type will highlight variations from

previous months.

A graph is available for this report (by clicking on the ‘pie chart’ icon at the top right of the report page) and the report can

be saved and e-mailed in the formats detailed in the reports overview.

5.2.11 Transmission Summary

This report breaks down your usage data and separates it according to the ‘transmission type’ used (i.e. how the call or

data is passed across the Vodafone network and therefore, in most cases, how it is then billed). Categories of

‘transmission type’ include: ‘SMS’ (text messaging), ‘Calls’, ‘MMS’ (multi-media messaging), ‘Video Calls’, Voice Calls,

Circuit Switched Data, Fax, Supplementary services, Mobile browsing and data and Purchase (content download such as

ringtones).

By default, the report is sorted according to cost – with the most expensive type of usage listed at the top – but the data

can be sorted by clicking on the red arrow underneath any of the column headings.


be saved and emailed in the formats detailed in the reports overview.

5.2.12 Bundle Usage

The Bundle usage report provides a simple summary view of how all bundles have been utilised within a billing period.

You can quickly see the usage that has qualified as ‘In bundle’ (i.e. counted against the inclusive minutes/data/text

allowance, as well as usage that has fallen outside bundle eligibility and therefore been charged.


be saved and emailed in the formats detailed in the reports overview.

5.3 My Reports

The ‘My reports’ functionality allows you to manage and run scheduled reports and customise reports to meet your

needs. You can create customised reports based on charges using the 'Charge reports' functionality or based on usage

using the ‘Call reports’ functionality.

5.3.1 Scheduled Reports

Any report either standard or user-created via ‘My reports’ which has been scheduled will appear in the scheduled reports

management portlet. The scheduled reports management portlet allows you to view the reports that have been set up,

re-run them, modify or delete them.

Selecting ‘edit’ enables you to choose the format you wish your report to be exported in, set up the report to run either as

a one-off or for every new billing period, and select email address(es) of people to whom the report should be emailed

once generated.



Scheduled reports can be run on all company structures (billing defined, custom defined and historic). However, if you

choose to run a report on an historic structure, the report will only be generated once on the structure the user created it

on.

5.3.2 Creating customised Call reports

'Call reports' produce customised reports based usage information. Clicking on the 'Call reports - New' link will present

you with a number of tabs (Who, Where, When, How etc) from which you can select the information and variables you

want to create your custom report from.

Each tab contains a number of filters and the details you enter here will determine the parameters and content of the

custom report you generate. You don’t need to go through every single tab to generate a report – you can click on the

‘Run’ or ‘Save and run’ buttons at any stage to generate the report based on the criteria you’ve selected at that point.

The ‘Where’, ’When’, ’How’, ’Duration’, ‘Cost’ and ‘Sort By’ tabs allow you to enter filters to further narrow your usage

report and define how the data will be sorted when presented. .

As you build up your report the 'Your selected criteria' box on the right hand side of the screen will build up a list of your

selected filters and reporting criteria.

To save reports for future use click the 'Save and run' button. Your new report will then be displayed on the “Reports

overview” page below the Call Reports – new menu. Once saved, reports can be updated as and when required. If you

schedule your saved report, it will appear in the scheduled reports management portlet.

5.3.3 Creating customized Charge reports

'Charge reports' produce customised reports based on charges. By clicking on the 'Charge reports - new' link will present

you with a number of tabs (Who, When, How, Charge etc) from which you can select the information and variables you

want to create your custom report from.

Each tab contains a number of filters and the details you enter here will determine the parameters and content of the

custom report you generate. You don’t need to go through every single tab to generate a report – you can click on the

‘Run’ or ‘Save and run’ buttons at any stage to generate the report based on the criteria you’ve selected at that point.

The ’When’, ’How’, ‘Charge’ and ‘Sort By’ tabs allow you to enter filters to further narrow your charge report (setting up the

elements that you wish to report on), as well as how the data will be sorted when presented.

As you build up your report the 'Your selected criteria' box on the right hand side of the screen will build up a list of your

selected filters and reporting criteria.

To save reports for future use click the 'Save and run' button. Your new report will then be displayed on the Reports

overview page. Once saved, reports can be updated as and when required. If you schedule your saved report, it will

appear in the scheduled reports management portlet.



5.4 File Exports

The File exports feature enables you to download raw billing data files in CSV format which can be merged and sorted in

your preferred accounting or data base software. Data extracts are available to all users irrespective of their position in

the company structure; however, the data will be just for the phone numbers they have permission to view.

File exports are billing period and company structure aware, if you need to change this you need to do this on the

dashboard.

Files will be downloaded in .CSV. Once a report has been scheduled to run, the status changes from ‘Not Scheduled’ to

‘Waiting to be created’ and the action changes from ‘Schedule data extract’ to ‘view details’. Once the extract is ready this

message will change to ‘Ready for download’ and the user can download the data extract or reschedule a new one.

Users can view other portlets while the data extract is being created,

Please note on the data extracts, an Â will be displayed in the cost column if the user is not using Excel 2003 SP3 and

above for Excel compatibility, if the download uses notepad the Â will not be displayed and the associated currency

symbol will be displayed.

5.4.1 Usage Download

The Usage download file is available to all users and downloads a file of all your usage records (please note recurring

charges are not included). Click on the ’schedule data export’ link and you will be informed on screen when your

download is available to view.

5.4.2 Phone Summary

The phone summary data export is available to all users and downloads a file of charges and usage with all information relative to an individual phone number.

Information included; Total charge, Recurring charges/credits, Usage charges/credits, cost/number of calls while in the UK, cost/number of calls when roaming, cost/number of messages while in UK, cost/number of messages while roaming, cost/volume of mobile browsing and data while in the UK, cost/volume of roamed browsing and data, cost/volume of purchases and VAT information.

vodafone bill manager · vodafone bill manager – user guide v1 15/12/2011 c1 unclassified page 4...

Documents