In Scope, a credit limit can be applied to each customer. When the customer exceeds the credit limit, the user can be prevented from taking actions on shipment that will cause costs. This feature can be activated by Riege support.
Contact the Riege Service team via F12 or the Scope Service Request form to activate Credit Limit Blocking.
If the credit limit block functionality is activated, each shipment will require a debtor to print documents, create declarations, transport orders, etc. If there is no debtor on the shipment, an error message will appear "None of the addresses (Consignor/Shipper, Consignee, Ordering customer) is a debtor."
Applying a credit limit to a Debtor
The credit limit for a customer is stored in the customer Debtor role.
- Open the customer in partner maintenance (Master Data > Partner)
- Go to the role Debtor (or add it).
- In the Debtor role, on the main tab General you will see the field Credit Limit.
In the field "Credit Limit" enter the amount of credit you will extend to the customer.
Note the "Open Balance" details below the "Credit Limit" field, these show the unpaid balances still owed by the customer. These figures will be considered when determining the current total amount of credit available to the customer.
An example of the credit limit check blocking a customer on a shipment
In the example below, the customer Berry Flavors LLC is blocked and we see the error:
Unblocking a credit limit blocked shipment
When a partner has exceeded the credit limit, there are 3 options:
- Open balances get below the credit limit due to payments of the partner.
- A user with authority may adjust the partner's credit limit and increase the amount of credit allowed.
- A user with authority may grant waiver on this particular shipment.
Give your system administrator a list of users who may change the permitted credit amount and a list of users who may override the credit check.
Depending on your configuration, Scope can also show a yellow warning message on an exceeded credit limit when your try a finalize an outgoing invoice.
Extended credit limit check
A new extended credit limit check can be activated as an alternative to the existing one. The idea behind this is to reserve amounts for expected invoices from the invoice recipient's available credit limit on a shipment. Actions that lead to significant costs for the carrier are blocked until an estimate of the expected invoice amount is available.
- This prevents a shipment from being blocked for exceeding the credit limit after reservations have already been made with carriers.
- The exceeding of a credit limit, e.g. due to the simultaneous processing of several shipments, is recognized in advance.
- The credit limit check can be limited to those partners that are to be invoiced.
Contact the Riege Service team via F12 or the Scope Service Request form to activate Credit Limit Blocking.
Registration of expected invoice amounts
Expected invoice amounts can be registered automatically by Scope. They can either be copied from a linked quotation or calculated by activity types, tariffs and income estimates. Alternatively, they may be registered manually.
Manual registration takes place on the General tab with the F7 action Expected invoice amounts in the Sender, Recipient, Agent and Customer fields.
A dialogue showing all expected invoice amounts can be opened on the jobcosting tab.
Blocking actions that lead to significant costs
As long as no expected invoice amount has been registered, actions that lead to significant costs for the forwarder are blocked by a new soft-block in Scope. Since a soft-block should only block selected actions on a shipment to allow undisturbed work it does not lead to a validation error and no new shipment block entry is created.
A dialogue is showing a blocked action e.g. e-AWB printout and gives advice for further action.
We identified five types of actions that lead to significant costs:
| Bookings | Air Export | Ocean Export | Air Import | Ocean Import | Simple Shipment |
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pickup transport order printout & transmission | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | n/a | n/a | ✗ |
| FCL Pickup transport order printout & transmission | n/a | n/a | ✗ | n/a | n/a | ✗ |
| Other transport order printouts & transmissions | n/a | ✗ | ✗ | ✗ | ✗ | ✗ |
| Air: Airwaybill printout & transmission | n/a | ✗ | n/a | n/a | n/a | n/a |
| Ocean: Carrier booking, ocean B/L or Fiata FCR printout & transmission | n/a | n/a | ✗ | n/a | n/a | n/a |
Actions marked with a tick are not blocked, as it is common practice to perform such service even when the credit limit is exceeded, while those marked with X are blocked.
Exceeded credit limits
When an expected invoice amount cannot be reserved successfully from the credit limit of a partner, it is implied, that the credit limit would be exceeded when fulfilling the shipment. Therefore a hard-block is applied on the shipment by showing a validation error and creating a new shipment block entry. Such a block can be resolved by granting a waiver when the user has a corresponding permission.
By granting a waiver on a shipment, the user authorizes the exceeding of the credit limit of a certain partner on the respective shipments by the specified amount. This allows other users to create invoices up to the entered expected invoice amount, even if they are not allowed to exceed the credit limit. As a result, the shipment can be continued.
Blocked shipments can be continued when a waiver is granted.
Import
Import of data is described here:
How can I import credit limits or open balances?