Release 47

Tokenized ACH Payments Added for Braintree Payment Gateway (DEV-10591)

A new Tokenized Automated Clearing House (ACH) payment method has been introduced as part of Aria’s integration with the Braintree payment gateway. ACH payment tokenization adds another level of data security in that sensitive account and number routing data is replaced by a random string of alphanumeric data stored in a reference token. The ACH processor has the full account and routing number securely stored and, using the matching token, processes the ACH transaction.

This payment method can be accessed from the following locations within the Aria application:

• Account Payment Methods (Accounts > [search for an account] > Payment Methods > New Payment Method > Payment Type)
• Billing Groups (Accounts > [search for an account] > Plans > Billing Groups > New Billing Group > Payment Method/Secondary Payment Method)
• Payment Methods (Configuration > Payments > Payment Gateways > Braintree > Field Options)
• Collection Groups (Configuration > Payments > Collection Groups > Braintree > Advanced Options)

Learn more about Aria’s Braintree payment gateway configuration from here.

New Client Parameter To Specify Dunning Behavior For Payment Terms Plans (DEV-10747)

This feature introduces a new instance-wide Invoicing parameter, "Auto Exit Dunning When Balance is Zero - Payment Terms". When set to "True", a Master Plan Instance billed via Payment Terms will exit Dunning (becoming Active) immediately upon its balance reaching zero. When set to "False", the Master Plan Instance will remain in Dunning until the next degrade date, when Aria's daily batch process would remove it from Dunning.

Master Plan Instance Dropdown Enhanced to List Unlimited Plans (DEV-10750)

The Master Plan Instance dropdown in the Usage History, Rated/Unbilled and Cash Credits UI screens has been enhanced to dynamically list all MPIs associated with the account without any limitation on the number of master plan instances (MPIs). To access in Aria, go to Accounts > Usage > Usage History | Rated/Unbilled Usage tabs for the Master Plan Instance dropdown in both screens. For Cash Credits, click Accounts > [search for account] > Payments & Credits > Cash Credits tab and when a given account has multiple MPIs, a Select Master Plan Instance dropdown is available for selection at the bottom of the screen. 

Ability To Display Child Account Supplemental Field Values On Parent Statements (DEV-10759)

This feature introduces the ability to display supplemental field values specified for child accounts on parent statements. For example, you can store a VAT Registration Number for a child account, then display that on a parent statement. Contact Aria Customer Support or your TAM team if you would like to implement this in an existing statement template.

New Avalara Communication Tax Configuration for US and EU Taxation (DEV-10769)

The Avalara Communication Tax engine is introduced with this release for US and EU taxation requirements. This is available for tax, post, refund, and void actions, as well as refund reversals, credit memos, and write-offs. Geocode support is also part of Aria's Avalara Communication Tax integration to ensure precision in tax calculation. In addition, the existing Avalara tax service will be renamed to BillSoft Communications Tax; it will be unavailable for new customers, though existing customers will be supported.

The Avalara Communication Tax configuration can be accessed as follows within the Aria application: Configuration > Integrations > Taxation Configuration > New > Method (for a new configuration).

Aria’s Avalara Communication Tax configuration also includes enhanced functionality based on client use cases for taxation calculation. The Bill From and Ship From address fields enable clients to configure the service location apart from doing so at the plan instance and service location levels within the Aria application.

Click here to learn more about creating a taxation configuration.

Discount Amounts Capped At Charge Amount (DEV-10796)

This feature ensures that, when multiple percentage-based discount rule coupons are applied to an invoice totalling more than 100%—when the Discount Behavior is "Gross"—the total of the discounts does not exceed the charge amount.

Application Fixes 

• Plan rollovers from a free to a non-free plan now reset the plan start date and usage billing period as expected. (TICKET-18907)
• For an account with a card payment method mapped to the Vantiv payment gateway, or an account with a Vantiv collection account group mapped to a billing group, the Vantiv account updater now automatically updates card information for tokenized and non-tokenized cards. (TICKET-18957)
• Client-created coupon list query processing was modified to display the correct “End Date” and “Number of Uses” data. In the UI, this applies to the End Date and Number of uses fields in Marketing > Coupons > [select Coupon]. (TICKET-18980)

Tokenized ACH Payments Added for Braintree Payment Gateway (DEV-10591)

With this release, Aria now enhances selected APIs with the Tokenized ACH payment method, providing additional data security via a token used by an ACH processor in concert with an account number and routing number to process payments. The existing <bank_acct_num>, <bank_routing_number> or <agreement_id> along with the <bank_acct_type> fields must be passed in these APIs when payment method 48 (for Tokenized ACH) is selected.

The Tokenized ACH Payment method is supported by the following APIs:

• assign_acct_plan_m
• collect_from_account_m
• create_acct_billing_group_m
• create_acct_complete_m
• create_order_m
• manage_pending_invoice_m
• settle_account_balance_m
• update_acct_billing_group_m
• update_acct_complete_m
• update_acct_plan_multi_m
• update_order_m
• update_payment_method_m

Learn more about Aria's Braintree integration from here.

Client_item_id and filter_client_item_id Fields Eliminated From Several API Calls (DEV-10717)

Admintools and Core APIs will no longer honor the deprecated API fields <client_item_id> and <filter_client_item_id> to avoid constraint errors when using Aria's Copy Config functionality. These fields were deprecated in Release 43 via DEV-10555, and in this release they are deleted from API documentation. If you are impacted, Customer Support Representatives have already contacted you to ensure this will not impact your existing usage of APIs and reporting.

You should remove all <client_item_id> and <filter_client_item_id> data and replace them with <client_sku> before Release 47 goes to production.

Copy Config requires that the <client_item_id> columns on both the source and destination be converted to <client_sku>. Only after the source and destination columns have been changed will Copy Config identify the conflicts between source and destination correctly. A fresh export is required before importing; previously exported files will fail to import correctly. 

API Call get_usage_history_m Modified To Allow Finer Control of Results (DEV-10782)

This feature removes mandatory field validation in the get_usage_history_m API call and adds the output parameter <filtered_usage_count>. The fields <date_range_start>, <invoice_no>, <client_record_id>, <specified_usage_type_no>, and <specified_usage_type_code> are no longer mandatory. If no value is specified for any of these fields, Aria will now return records based on the default value of <billed_filter>—introduced in Release 46—which is "0". This returns both billed and unbilled usage records. You could also specify a value for <billed_filter> of 1 (billed records only) or 2 (unbilled records only). The field <filtered_usage_count> can be used to paginate large result sets.

Ability To Identify Custom Rates For Orders In API Calls (DEV-10784)

This feature adds the output field <custom_rate_ind> to the API calls create_order_m, update_order_m, create_order_with_plan_m, get_order_m, get_order_items_m, and get_order_details_m. This field indicates whether or not a custom rate was applied to an order on an invoice. Aria has also added other output fields to the API calls get_order_m and get_order_details_m.

API Fixes 

• The API call edit_acct_plan_queued_changes_m now honors the <queue_edit_directive> values of "1" (Execute queued plan change immediately) and "2" (Change the effective date of the queued plan change) as expected. When the <queue_edit_directive> "2" is specified, the queued plan change executes at the date specified in the <new_effective_date> field. Also, Aria now validates the <queue_id> field when specified and, if the value is not valid, returns <error_code> = 24014, "Not a valid Queue Id".  (TICKET-18931)
• Aria now uses the custom rates specified in update_acct_plan_multi_m API calls that generate combined invoices for both full and prorated invoices. (TICKET-18954)
• Client-created coupon list query processing was modified to display the correct “End Date” and “Number of Uses” data. For the get_coupon_m API call, specifically, this applies to the <expires_after> output parameter expiry data (end date and number of uses) response. (TICKET-18980)