Account Management Overview
Account Management System Functionality
Customer Information Management System (CIMS) enables creation and maintenance of customer accounts and associated billing accounts. It is used in conjunction with the ePermitting System (EPS) to provide customer billing information. CIMS has the flexibility to allow for the addition of customer account information for other permitting systems that will be added to EPS in the future.
CIMS consists of two types of accounts: Customer and Billing. These accounts have a parent/child relationship. The customer account contains customer-specific information that includes contact, insurance, and agreement information. Attachments and notes can be stored with customer accounts. Customer accounts are not billed. Each customer account for a utility must have at least one billing account.
As the name implies, billing accounts are created to establish where invoices for permit and inspection fees are sent. A customer account can have multiple billing accounts, which provides, especially for larger business partners, the flexibility of determining where invoices are sent.
Customer and billing account numbers are assigned by CIMS when they are created. Intelligence is not built into the numbering scheme, which allows for reassignment flexibility when a company changes owners. As an example, ABC Utility Company has four billing accounts, one for each of its regions in Pennsylvania. When it sells its business in two of the four regions to another utility, those regional billing accounts can be associated easily with the new owner in CIMS by simply changing the parent/child relationship from ABC Utility Company to the buyer customer account.
Customer management is a function of PennDOT Central Office. An authorized user creates and manages all customer accounts. District users can access CIMS in read-only format.