Configuring Bill Rate History
Overview
Bill Rate History gives your organization control over how Bill Rates are stored and maintained over time.
When enabled, each new transaction saves the Bill Rate that was used when the transaction was created. This helps preserve historical reporting while still allowing future transactions to use updated rates.
This article explains the available configuration options and provides recommendations for common business scenarios.
Before You Enable Bill Rate History
Before enabling Bill Rate History, consider how your organization wants historical transactions to behave.
Ask the following questions:
Should historical reports always show the Bill Rate that was originally used?
Should editing a historical transaction recalculate its Bill Rate?
Do you occasionally update historical Bill Rates after contract or pricing changes?
Are invoices generated from historical transactions that must remain unchanged?
There is no single correct configuration. The appropriate settings depend on your organization's business processes.
Company Settings
Two company settings control Bill Rate History.
Keep Bill Rate History
When enabled, the system stores the Bill Rate on each new Punch and Paid Time Off (PTO) transaction.
Benefits include:
Historical reports remain consistent.
Previously generated invoices can be reproduced more accurately.
Future Bill Rate changes do not normally affect existing transactions.
If this option is disabled, transactions continue to determine their Bill Rate using the current employee configuration whenever reports or exports are generated.
Update Bill Rate on Transaction Changes
This setting determines what happens when an existing transaction is modified.
When enabled:
Editing a transaction recalculates its Bill Rate using the current employee configuration.
When disabled:
Editing most transaction details preserves the original stored Bill Rate.
This option is useful for organizations that want historical transactions to reflect current billing policies after corrections are made.
Recommended Configurations
Preserve Historical Billing (Recommended)
Use this configuration if historical accuracy is your highest priority.
Keep Bill Rate History: Enabled
Update Bill Rate on Transaction Changes: Disabled
With this configuration:
Historical Bill Rates remain unchanged.
Future transactions use current Bill Rates.
Reports remain consistent over time.
This is the recommended configuration for most organizations.
Recalculate During Transaction Corrections
Use this configuration if edited transactions should reflect current billing rules.
Keep Bill Rate History: Enabled
Update Bill Rate on Transaction Changes: Enabled
With this configuration:
New transactions store their Bill Rate.
Editing an existing transaction recalculates the Bill Rate.
Corrected transactions may display a different Bill Rate than when originally created.
How Bill Rates Are Assigned
When a transaction is created, the system determines the Bill Rate using the following order:
Employee Bill Rate
Calculated Bill Rate using the transaction's effective Pay Rate and the applicable Billing Factor
Blank, if neither value can be determined
The resulting value is stored on the transaction when Bill Rate History is enabled.
Administrative Maintenance
Certain administrative tools may update stored Bill Rates when configured to do so.
Examples include:
Transaction maintenance utilities
Timecard Tools that recalculate Bill Rates
Other administrative processes designed to refresh historical data
Because these tools can affect historical transactions, they should be used carefully and only by authorized administrators.
Best Practices
To help maintain accurate historical billing information, Sundial recommends the following:
Enable Bill Rate History before making significant Bill Rate changes.
Decide whether historical edits should preserve or recalculate Bill Rates before going live.
Avoid unnecessary recalculation of historical transactions after invoices have been issued.
Test configuration changes in a non-production environment whenever possible.
Ensure administrators understand how maintenance tools affect historical Bill Rates.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does enabling Bill Rate History change existing transactions?
No.
Enabling the feature affects new transactions going forward. Existing transactions remain unchanged unless an administrator performs an operation that updates historical Bill Rates.
Can I change these settings later?
Yes.
Company settings can be modified at any time. However, changing them affects how future transaction updates are processed and may influence the behavior of administrative maintenance tools.
Should I enable automatic Bill Rate updates when editing transactions?
That depends on your business process.
Organizations that require strict historical reporting typically leave this option disabled. Organizations that want corrected transactions to reflect current billing policies may choose to enable it.
Next Steps
If you are experiencing unexpected Bill Rate behavior or need assistance determining why a transaction contains a particular Bill Rate, see Troubleshooting Bill Rate History.