Introduction to Business Rules

Business Rules are established to control certain aspects of your software. In addition to many other areas, Business Rules affect:

• Which fields are active for data entry

• Which fields are required for data entry

• Default values

• Label sizing

• Renewal notice formats

• Bundle top parameters

Business Rules can be established at the business, company, publication, bill source, and user division levels.

The Business–Company–Publication (BCP) Hierarchy

The business-company-publication hierarchy represents a business structure: there is only one business, which owns one or more companies. Each of these companies owns or operates one or more publications. Business Rules set at one level affect all entities below that level in the business structure, as illustrated in the following diagram.

Any of these three entities can decide what the Business Rules are. Many organizations take a strict approach and enforce one set of Business Rules identically across all companies and publications. These organizations set their Business Rules at the business level, and everyone operates in exactly the same way no matter how many companies or publications the business operates. Some organizations need more flexibility, which usually reflects local market conditions. They allow companies and publications to make their own decisions about how to operate their enterprise.

Some Business Rules may also be established at the billing source, user division, and deliverable levels. The first task in establishing Business Rules is to determine the role of the levels in how the rules are administered.

Note: Not all Business Rules can be set at all levels. Most settings do not allow entry at the bill source or user division levels.

The Billing Source

You create billing sources in order to govern a whole host of account finance issues, including finance charges, whether unapplied payments are applied automatically during billing, which default sort sequence is used for printing account invoices, and what appears on them. The billing source, therefore, is your means to “program in” the flexibility you need to handle billing-related issues.

For example, suppose your newspaper bills the single copy outlets (dealers) weekly and home delivery routes monthly and the finance charge options vary between the two groups:

1. How frequently to bill: How often will these distribution points be billed? For example, you may decide to bill single copy outlets more frequently in order to avoid large balance amounts at the single copy outlets.

2. What is the most current age period for which a finance charge should be applied: Which past-due aging period should the finance charge amount use for calculations? For example, you may decide to finance charge single copy outlets on all past-due balances, but finance charge home delivery routes on the fourth aging period balance.

The following table summarizes the different billing requirements for these distribution points.

Distribution Point	Billing Attributes	Billing Attributes
Dealers	Billing Frequency	Once per week
	Age period for finance charge	1
Home Delivery	Billing Frequency	Once per month
	Age period for finance charge	4

To set up the system for these different billing requirements, you could follow these steps:

1. Define two billing sources (weekly and monthly, for example) by selecting Setup | Accounting | Account Billing | Bill Source and following the instructions for this menu option in the Setup Manual.

2. Specify how frequently bills are sent by defining statement periods for each billing source. Do this by selecting Setup | Accounting | Account Billing | Statement Calendar and following the instructions for this menu option in the Setup Manual. Note that Business Rules play no role in this step.

3. Specify that the decision to define the age period for finance charge calculation will be made for each billing source individually. Do this by going into Rules and entering the applicable settings (highlighted below) to “BillSource”. Then, for each billing source, specify which age period to use for finance charge calculations.

Business Rules Format

The Business Rules are presented as questions along with the levels at which they can be set: B = business, C = company, P = publication, S = bill source, D = deliverable, and Dv = division. Following the levels will be the Cloud configurable setting for the Business Rule. This can be:

• Client. Cloud clients can configure the Business Rule.

• NCS. Clients cannot configure the Business Rule, but Naviga Support can change the configuration, if needed.

• Non. The Business Rule is not configurable for Cloud sites.

For example, the Business Rule...Which day(s) of the week must be reported separately to AAM? BCP (Client) …can be set at the business, company, or publication level, and can be configured by Cloud clients.

Below the Business Rule question the parameter is described, and valid answers, if applicable, are listed. Default answers are in bold. If the Cloud default is different than the on-premises default, the Cloud default will be in bold and the on-premises default will be noted in that answer.

Many settings are “self-contained” in the sense that your response to them does not affect how you set other Business Rules. In some cases, however, how you set rule A affects whether and how you set rule B. In this case, we say that rules are “nested.”

The answers to certain Business Rules that pertain to credit card information (user names, passwords, etc.) are encrypted once they are entered. To view the encrypted answer in the Business Rules or on the Business Rules Settings report, you must be logged in with a user ID that has access to the transaction security ID “BusRuleEncrypt.” See Transaction Security for more information.

How to Set a Business Rule

There are three types of settings for Business Rules:

• Yes/no

• Multiple choice

• Fill in the blank

To set a Business Rule:

1. In character Circulation, select Business Rules from the Setup | Rules menu.

   
2. The Business Rules Setup screen will appear. Business Rules are contained within sections, such as AAM and Account Finance (select Section from the menu). The General section is displayed initially.

   
3. Select Modify, highlight a Business Rule, and press Enter. The cursor will rest in the word “Business” in the Level column.

4. Change the level to Company, Publication, Bill Source, or Division, if desired.

5. Press Enter again, and the setting for the Business Rule will be displayed. This is the default answer. If you do not wish to change the setting, select Exit from the strip menu and go on to step 3.

   
6. To change the setting, select Modify and press Enter. Then, enter a valid setting of your choice.

7. Press Enter, followed by F4, and then select Exit to exit from the question.

8. Scroll down and set the remaining Business Rules in the General section. Press F4 to access the strip menu.

9. Select Section and then highlight another section to set the Business Rules in that section. Then select Exit to exit to the Setup menu. You can modify settings as often as you like.

Note: A few Business Rules for Cybersource involving transaction keys or shared secret keys require very long answers and cannot be answered via the standard Business Rules option. Select Oversized Rules from the Rules menu in Graphical Setup to answer these questions.

The Rules Report

At some point, you may want a report that lists all of the Business Rules and their settings. The Rules report contains this information.

To create this report:

1. Select Rules Report from the Rules menu to display the Business Rules Settings screen.

   
2. Click the Add button and indicate which section of Business Rules should be printed. Check All Sections if all sections should print.

3. Click OK and then Continue to produce the report. See the User Manual for information about viewing and printing reports. An example of the Business Rules Settings report is shown below.

Example — Rules Report

The Configuration Report

The Configuration Report lists, by section or for all sections, the Business Rules that are client-configurable in the Cloud, DTI-configurable in the Cloud, client or DTI-configurable in the Cloud, not configurable in the Cloud, or all Business Rules.

To create this report:

1. Select Configuration Report from the Rules menu.

   
2. Click the Add button and complete the fields in the following table.

   Field	Type	What to enter
   ALL SECTIONS	yes/no	Flag this field to include all sections of Business Rules in the report. If you leave this field unchecked, you must specify one or more sections to include in SECTION.
   SECTION	predefined	If All Sections is unchecked, specify the section to include in this report. Click the lookup icon to the right of this field to multi-select sections.
   CONFIGURABLE BY	predefined	Indicate the “configurable” status of the Business Rules you want to include in the report. You have the following options: All Configurable (configurable by either DTI or the client) Client Configurable (configurable by the client) DTI Configurable Only (configurable only by DTI personnel) Everything (all Business Rules) Non-Configurable (Business Rules that are not configurable)

3. Click OK and then Continue to produce the report. An example is shown below.

Example—Configuration Report