Workflow Management
Many of the functional areas within CMP
Converged Monetisation Platform. The MDS Global product that supports customer care and billing for digital service providers. use Workflow Events Manually or automatically created task items that drive and record activity within CMP. Sometimes referred to as Diary Events..
Workflow Events drive and record activity within CMP. Every Workflow Event has a unique reference number to enable an audit trail.
Workflow Events can be added at different levels within the customer In the context of the Cloud Monetisation Platform, an individual or organisation who has signed an agreement to take goods and services from a service provider. A customer receives a bill associated with one or more subscriptions, and can be a single end user or a large company with many subscriptions assigned to one agreement. hierarchy and can be reported upon as required.
Workflow Events can be initiated automatically as a result of system driven activity, or manually to record or instigate activity against a customer, for example:
- Log customer calls and correspondence
- Produce communications
- Produce one-off invoices and credit notes
- Communicate with a network In the context of CMP, the infrastructure on which usage of registered customers will be measured – this could be a mobile phone network, broadband network or other non-telecommunications network. provider to request actions such as connecting or disconnecting a device
- Automate procedures, for example, Credit Control and Payment Management.
Workflow Events are typically aligned to the business processes of the service provider The owner of the infrastructure in which accounts will be created. The Service Provider can host and operate the instance of CMP, or CMP can be provided as a Managed Service..
Workflow Events are categorised by a Type and identified by a Code:
- Workflow Event Types are used to represent various categories of events or departments, for example Credit Control, Customer Service or Provisioning.
- Workflow Event Codes are allocated within each event type to represent events or procedures within the business, for example Credit control bar, Credit control disconnect.
Each Workflow Event Code can be configured with different Actions attached that minimise the amount of manual intervention involved in managing the customer and/or business procedure:
- A Workflow Event requiring no user A person with the capability to log in to the CMP GUI software, such as a customer service advisor or agent. interaction that has a defined purpose or Action can be configured to automatically process through to resolution.
- Other Workflow Events, which may require user interaction, can be configured to start in an Open status before being manually processed, once any required information is captured.
Resolution of a Workflow Event can trigger another Workflow Event to be created, supporting the execution of business processes.
Workflow Event Actions
Workflow Event Actions are grouped into standard Action Types:
- Network Actions – sends commands to the network, for example connections or bars.
- Account In the Cloud Monetisation Platform, a billing entity that can be used to manage payments on one or more subscriptions or payments for services. An account can hold details such as payments or invoices. Type Movements – automatically transfers an Account from one Account Type to another.
- Subscription A billing entity that incurs a charge. Examples include a network attached device whose usage you want to measure and charge for, or a monthly software subscription Services – applies a service to a Subscription, for example, Line Charge, Itemised Billing, Direct Debit Fee, or Insurance.
The first Action Type relates to network activities. The second two Action Types relate to system activities.
Each Action is issued its own sequence number when added to a Workflow Event. CMP attempts to process Actions in sequential order.
A background process runs continuously to identify new Actions to be processed. Those requiring transmission to an external party, such as a network, are handed off to the appropriate interface. Updates are recorded in CMP when a response is received.
When a Workflow Event is processed, any unprocessed Actions are also processed and recorded as Actioned Items.
The Actioned Items feature provides a list of all Actions linked to a Workflow Event with details of both Network and Non-Network Actions, confirming which have been successfully processed and which have not.
Actions that fail to process present an error from one of two categories to the CMP user:
Processing Error
Checks are performed when a Workflow Eventis processed to validate the request being made is allowed.
- If these checks fail, the Action is given a Processing Error status and a meaningful description is presented.
- Examples of processing errors include trying to connect an already connected subscription or trying to remove a bar that has not been applied.
Confirmation Errors
Confirmation errors are used to handle rejection responses from independent processes or third parties.
- Examples include failed connectionsand failed number changes.
Worklists
Worklists are queues of Workflow Events that require user intervention. The events typically have a status of Open or Error. A Workflow Event can be configured to automatically fall into a defined Worklist, or will otherwise default to the queue of the person or process that generated it.
Workflow Events can be passed between Worklists. A user can assign a Workflow Event from a team Worklist to their own Worklist to perform the required task.
Workflow Events with a Closed status are not shown in Worklists but can be retrieved for auditing purposes via Search.
Tasks
The Tasks feature is a process-focused entry point to creating Workflow Events. Tasks represent a list of common business processes executed by users. The feature allows task-specific fields to be defined to support users in capturing the correct information when initiating a process.