Hi - we are in the process of implementing NS SSP/revenue allocation automation. Anyone care to share their likes/dislike of it? Is it working well for you? (Currently we're doing revenue allocation calculations manually)

i personally love it (but I am on the implementation side). The beauty of ARM is that with the correct (operative word) implementation a controller/CFO does not have to do anything in terms of recognizing revenue,; all they have to do is to look at the reports. How complex is your rev rec?

As an implementer, I really like it. Much more accurate and consistent than any manual process can be. You need to work out your use cases first and think thoroughly about the rules for how to allocate. Then do things in NS. Good requirements make good automation.

@Catherine Fray - QQ about deferred revenue impacts. Our deferred rev is broken out by service and subscriptions. Does the allocation adjust my deferred balances appropriately or will i have a miss-match between deferred amounts? For example, Deferred = invoiced $ amounts; but revenue rec being on the allocated values

NS will create (up to) 3 kinds of deferred revenue reclass JEs automatically to ensure you don't end the month with a debit position in Deferred Revenue

Okay - so we should really be testing these automated JE's for the #1 at the same time we're working on the allocation UAT.

Catherine, how do you handle the break out of the unbilled receivable for long and short term accounts?

@Phillip This is not automatically supported. ARM accepts only one global GL account for unbilled receivable. There are a variety of ways to manually or via script split amounts out.

got it. thats my only complaint about arm. its a pain not having the system being able to be able to handle short and long term accounts

But take care. It's very challenging to script because of the way the automated deferred rev reclass JEs are created/formatted. For most companies new to ARM, I recommend calculating the adjustment and putting in a manual reversing JE

thats what we do. I assume the short and long term is a popular enhancement

Maybe 15% of my ARM clients have wanted to split unbilled receivables. Some by short/long, some wanted to pull out particular types of revenue (i.e services).

@Catherine Fray - is the unbilled receivable JE that you are referring to in point 2 something that requires set-up within NetSuite? or a separate module? We have been live with ARM for a while but are making manually unbilled entries since I have not seen anything post automatically

@HN It doesn't require setup, only to run the process to generate Deferred Revenue Reclass Journals, right below Rev Rec JEs in the menu. Unfortunately many times I have seen clients not be trained on it (or the knowledge lost after go live). Try it out in your sandbox first...it can be a little jarring if you have not been running it since go-live.

@Catherine Fray - did you see the latest release notes? they are making rev rec JE and reclass JE as part of their period close management!! 👏🏻. about time!!!

So overdue! @Karina If I had a buck for every time I get a client whose partner (or PS!!!) just didn't teach them about it....I'd be retired

that’s because now it is “free” I think :)

@Catherine Fray - sorry going back to my previous question about the Deferred Revenue Reclass entries (for automatic unbilled posting) am I looking in the correct section? Transactions > Financials? I don't see anything for "Deferred Revenue Reclass Journals". Or is it Schedule Reclassification Journal Entries?

@HN yep, that's it

how do I know what Transactions Saved Search to use? or do I need to create one

Hover over that menu option and choose "Run Now" to get to the right page. It's like running rev rec JEs

Since I have seen things…. @HN, you should see a number other than 0 under Number of Transactions. If you do not (and likely you will not based on the fact you have never done this step systematically) go to your first year operating in NS and do it by year i.e. limit number of transactions NS has to review. Depending on your type of revenue the process may take a bit of time.

I'll point out something Karina's already implied - you may end up needing to go back in time, but this can be complex, esp if you were posting manual JEs for the same purpose that you now need to get rid of. Also, if you are in the habit of posting manual JEs impacting deferred revenue (including your past reclasses), you should know that this does not play well with ARM. They get stuck forever on the deferred revenue waterfall report

Yep... I'm seeing now thousands of transactions showing up in the "Number of Transactions" for older periods so this definitely seems tricky to try to use going forward

Yep. Every revenue arrangement has a hidden flag that marks it to be analyzed by the Deferred Revenue Reclass process. It's only "unchecked" by running the process on it, and it's "rechecked" every time you edit the arrangement, post revenue from it, or post an invoice related to it. This has good implications (for arrangements that never needed any JEs from this process, it'll just run once without actually posting anything and then again each month going forward) and bad (for arrangements that have had lots of this, it can be equally unsatisfying to just start running it today OR to go back to the beginning of time).

so would it not make sense to just pick this up effective with Jan 2023 close since it'll pick up all historic entries that never posted?

it would, but that’s where that 0 number of transactions may appear giving you impression everything is fine. Just FYI, this Number of Transaction number is just for evaluation by the script, i.e. you may end up with 0 journals. Maybe in a future, but not now for sure. And if you see this number now in 2023 it means NS cannot handle this many transactions and you need to go back, see my prev message