Rating error during charge trial run - create allowance

[former_member743232]

Hi Experts,

We are trying out the charge we modelled for allowance with create allowance operator in CC, using the trial run and we are unable to with the error: "An error occurred during initialization. Check that the rating structure is valid."

We are testing the allowance functionality of SAP BRIM. Upon successful creation of the contract, the create allowance fulfillment step is failing with a message cannot create allowance for allowance definition. Note we already followed the steps provided to configure from event class, allowance definition, charge plan and CCM.

We are thinking if the error in SAP CC is related. And how can we resolve it?

Thanks,

Paul

[former_member34]

Thank you for visiting SAP Community to get answers to your questions. Since this is your first question, I recommend that you familiarize yourself with our Q&A Tutorial: https://developers.sap.com/tutorials/community-qa.html, as it provides tips for preparing questions that draw responses from our members. Should you wish, you can revise your question by selecting Actions, then Edit.

By adding a picture to your profile you encourage readers to respond: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=46bt1juWUUM

Many thanks!

[francois_thimon · Accepted solution]

Hi Paul,

You're welcome.
We do not have a standard test procedure, but I meant that, when it comes to allowances, it is necessary to run "realistic" tests with an actual contract. You will therefore have to create these contracts the normal way: either manually with Core tool, or using your usual provisioning system.
This will result in creating real charged items and allowances, that you will be able to monitor the same with your usual tools.

If it helps, though, once you have initialized your subscriber data, you may be interested in using Cockpit to send your sample rating requests manually: it now contains an application called "Process a chargeable item", designed to help users run their tests. You may find this more handy than implementing our SOAP or Java API's. Here's the corresponding documentation:

https://help.sap.com/viewer/278665b90ecd4bf39f21a4d8ef5a4e46/2020.1/en-US/c1f5a971cd244c8c8bfb48c259...

Best regards.

François
SAP Convergent Charging Support

[former_member743232 · Accepted solution]

Hi Francois,

Awesome. Thank you very much, we'll look into this. Your detailed response has been very informative and will greatly help us.

Thanks,

Paul.

[francois_thimon · Accepted solution]

Hi Paul,

Thank you for your feedback.
To help other users, we are currently working on our documentation, in order to make it more explicit about this matter.

Best regards.

François
SAP Convergent Charging Support

[francois_thimon]

Hi Paul,

You're welcome.

Since the trial run only simulates the pricing logic execution, the "Create allowance" component has an actual effect only in the rater.
Consequently, if you want to run more advanced tests on this feature, our recommendation is to create sample subscriber data and directly involve the actual rater.

Apart from that, the error message you were getting in the beginning is probably due to the fact that the trial run did not properly handle "Create allowance" components, a couple years ago.
It is supposed to skip them and move on to the rest of the pricing logic but, in the past, this resulted in an error message similar to the one you reported.
We fixed this issue around mid-2018 so you should indeed expect to run into it if your CC release is older than that.

Can you please let me know if you need further information about this?

Best regards.

François
SAP Convergent Charging Support

[former_member743232]

Hi Francois,

So that explains the issue from the older release, thanks for the information.

While I still have your attention, let me maximize this opportunity, the recommendation you provided about the rater do we have a guide (maybe from application help, etc.) on how to proceed with testing this?

Thanks,

Paul.

[francois_thimon]

Hi Paul,

I've implemented a sample charge/allowance plan based upon your description but I do not get the same error.
For your information, though, the trial run is not designed to actually create allowances at all (only the rating process can do that). Your error message does not seem to come from there anyway.

Consequently, to see the actual problem, it would be best to get the export of your actual charge.
If you cannot send it, can you at least reproduce the scenario after having enabled the log files for Core tool? Since you seem to be using Windows, here are the steps:
1. open your Core tool script (i.e., core_tool.bat) in any text editor
2. locate the line where LOGS_ENABLED is set (it is normally on line 10)
3. change that line to set LOGS_ENABLED to "true", i.e., SET LOGS_ENABLED=true
4. relaunch Core tool from a terminal (rather than double-clicking on the script's icon)

After this, all error messages will be output to the terminal itself, and also to the log file whose path is defined by LOG_FILE_PATH, in core_tool.bat.
In order to find the root cause, can you please check these logs, or send them in a BCP ticket?

Thanks in advance.
Best regards.

François
SAP Convergent Charging Support

[former_member743232]

Thanks Francois

We have tried SAP CC 2020 UI and it seems the error is not appearing anymore during trial run. Just a follow-up question, is there any way to see if the allowance was successfully triggered in trial run in CC? Is there an identifier that tells us the allowance was created successfully or for example, a view to see if the fields in the event class were updated?

Thanks,

Paul.

[francois_thimon]

Hi Paul,

It's generally much easier to troubleshoot these issues using the affected pricing logic.
Will you to send it to us, please?
Since it may contain sensitive information, though, is it possible to open a ticket on BCP, or maybe to create a sample pricing logic, just to demonstrate the problem?

Thanks in advance.
Best regards.

François
SAP Convergent Charging Support

[former_member743232]

Hi Francois,

Thanks for your attention. This is the price plan read:

Price plan expressed in EUR

On occurrence of chargeable item 'ALLO'

Searching in mapping table [HB] Allowance V1

Compute ALLOW_END_DATE = Charge Effective Date + computed.Validity Day(s)

To Pay: EUR 0.00

Create an allowance for the plan [HB] Allowance Plan V1 starting on ALLOW_START_DATE and ending on ALLOW_END_DATE

Just a simple logic for us to test the allowance. But when testing (trial run) it we are encountering the message attached:

We are wondering if this is normal? Because, upon contract activation of the subscription contract in CRM, the create allowance is failing and we are not sure if this is the reason.

Thanks,

Paul.