Billing plans are the core of brightwheel billing, making it easy to automatically charge families for recurring services like monthly tuition or annual cleaning fees. Set up plans to bill on a regular schedule (E.g. weekly, annually, etc.), ensuring smooth and consistent payments!
To know before you get started
When setting up a billing plan, you can assign it to one or multiple students and choose a recurring schedule:
Weekly, Bi-weekly (twice a week)
Monthly, Bimonthly (1st & 15th), Bimonthly (15th & end of month)
Quarterly
Annually
You can add charges from your Library or create new ones, apply discounts, and split balances between payers. Finally, you can set the plan start date, choose when the invoice will send to families or add any custom notes. You can also select a date when the plan will automatically end, for example if you know the student will be graduating.
Create a billing plan
Once you create a billing plan, you'll have the option to save it as a template for future use. If you already created a template and wish to build off that template to create a new plan, follow the steps to Create plans from a saved template.
Login to brightwheel on the web
Click Billing from the sidebar menu
At the top of the screen, press Select an action > Set up a billing plan
Continue through the remaining steps to add students, the frequency, discounts, or split the payment between multiple payers
Click Create plan(s) when finished
💡Tip: To understand what each field means when creating a billing plan, check out this guide: What do the different fields mean when creating a billing plan?
Create a plan from a saved template
Once you've create a billing plan template, you can return to your Billing Library to create a billing plan off the template. This saves you time by avoiding the need to recreate the plan for each new student.
Login to brightwheel on the web
From the sidebar menu, click Billing > Library
Next to the template, click Select an action > Set up a billing plan
Continue through the remaining steps to add students, the frequency, discounts, or split the payment between multiple payers
Click Create plan(s) when finished
Note: When you create a plan from a saved template, any edits made to that plan will not alter the saved template. For steps to edit the template, please visit Create & manage billing plan templates.
Add discounts to billing plans
When creating a billing plan, you'll see the option to add discounts to a specific charge by checking the Discount? box. Next, you'll enter the discount amount either in dollars ($) or as a percentage, add the discount description/reason, and any notes for the families to see.
Add discounts to existing plans
If a plan has been created, you can go back and edit the plan to add discounts for individual students. This is helpful if you set up billing plans for many students but only a few receive discounts.
Log in to brightwheel on the web
Go to Billing > Students > Student Plans
Click Actions > View / Edit next to the plan, then Actions > Edit charge next to the individual charge in the plan
Check the Discounts? box to add discount details, then Save
Continue through the steps, then click Update billing plan to save
FAQs
Are discounts visible to families?
Are discounts visible to families?
Yes! Families can see the discount amount, the discount description and reason, along with any custom notes added. Here's how it appears for families:
Split billing plan charges between payers & agencies
If families want to split invoices or set up co-pays across multiple payers, or students have an alternate funding source that pays for their childcare costs (e.g. government subsidy agency), you can easily set this up in a billing plan.
When adding a charge to the plan, you'll turn on the Assign charge to specific payer(s)? and then select the amount each payer is responsible for.
Note: Discounts must be added before splitting the charge and they'll be applied proportionally based on the subtotals due for each payer.
FAQs
How do split payments appear for families and agencies?
How do split payments appear for families and agencies?
If you split charges, the family payers will all receive notifications of charges based on the porton they're responsible for. Agencies cannot pay directly through brightwheel, so you'll need to take steps to manually log payments made by agencies and apply the payment against any invoices.
FAQs
How do I set up billing plans for siblings?
How do I set up billing plans for siblings?
You can simply create a separate billing plan for each sibling and then parents will have the option to pay the total balance for both student's in their account. Learn more about billing siblings here.
What do the different fields mean when creating a billing plan?
What do the different fields mean when creating a billing plan?
Plan name: Describes the plan, this will be visible to you but will not be seen by your families.
First payment due date: Sets when the first payment for the plan is due.
Last payment due date [Optional]: This is the last date a charge will be due, and the plan will expire on this selected date. If no last payment date is selected, the plan will repeat until you manually pause or delete it
When should payers receive invoices? This is the timing of when invoices should be sent to families before their payment is due - this gives families an opportunity to review their charges before paying. For example, you may want invoices to go out 5 days before payment is due.
Dates of service [Optional]: Shows families the time period that payers are being charged for, relative to the billing period and your first billing period date. While an optional field, we highly recommend setting a billing period so that families can reference the dates for taxes or applying for reimbursement for childcare.
Notes: This will show up on each invoice for payers to see
Can I add dates of service to a plan retroactively?
Can I add dates of service to a plan retroactively?
Once you create a billing plan, you can't edit the plan to add dates of service after it has been posted. As a workaround to this, you can edit the notes section of the plan to add the dates of service there, or you can delete the billing plan and create a new one with the dates of service added.
Can I create a plan directly from a child's billing profile?
Can I create a plan directly from a child's billing profile?
Yes! On most pages within brightwheel, such as a student's billing profile, you'll conveniently see the Select an action button at the top of the page, which can be clicked to create a billing plan.