How to add and set up a FedEx Billing Account [Step-by-Step guide]

NOTE: The requirements and instructions refer to the FedEx SOAP connection.

When setting up your Clients in techShip, you will have to configure Billing Accounts to ship through them. These use a Baseline Account as a foundation, but their way to work could be different based on the Client's needs.

When setting Billing Accounts, you will be able to specify how it should work for that specific client, setting label references, packing slips usage, rate shopping, markups, WMS information updating and Carrier options such as the default service level, address validation, sender and return addresses, etc.

This article describes the procedure to set up a FedEx billing account, while others are specifically written for other Carriers.

Feel free to follow the step-by-step guide written below or the video guide, as you prefer:

To set up a FedEx billing account, define the following and then Save:

ADD THE ACCOUNT TO THE CLIENT PROFILE

1. Access Clients under the Maintenance menu

2. Click on the Client for which you wish to set up the billing account

3. Press Add Billing Account

4. Select the source account which will be used and Save

5. Edit the Billing account

SET UP THE GENERAL OPTIONS

The General Options tab is the same for every carrier. If you are already acquainted with it from previous setups, please configure it accordingly.

If this is your first time setup or you aren't acquainted to it, refer to the following article and once finished, return to this one to set up the carrier specific options:

How to configure the Billing Account General Options tab [Step-by-Step guide]

SET UP THE CARRIER OPTIONS 

The Carrier Options tab allows to set up basic and advanced features of your FedEx billing account.

NOTE: For a FULL detail on the available fields in this section, check the following article: FedEx Small Parcel Billing Account field details [Information]

These are the key elements:

A) Default Service Code: Choose a service code to assign to imported orders which don’t have a service code or keep it if they have. If you wish to overwrite any code coming from the WMS with the chosen service, check “Override WMS Service Code”.
You can choose between the service level that comes with the order, ECO mode which grabs the cheapest service or an arbitrary service level for all cases. You can go in depth on this subject in this article.

B) Contact Phone: Specify the phone number associated with this billing account and its handling.

C) Billing Account Number, Payment Type and Country: Specify which account number is to be billed and how (Prepaid, Sender, Third Party, Collect, etc), as well as to which country the account is associated to.

The available payment types are the following:

• Account: Child account under your main account (NOT your account, if you are to use your account, use Sender)
• Recipient: A person or entity holder/owner of a FedEx account (NOT the consignee, if you will bill the consignee, use Collect)
• Collect: Bills the consignee for the shipment
• Sender: Bills the account number specified as the account holder/owner (typically default option)
• Third Party: Bills the account number specified in Third Party mode, using your Baseline Account as the shipper, but billing the account specified for the charges. 
  NOTE: If you will automate this by feeding the billing terms/type and third party account number from the order end and not through techShip's set up, enable Order Level TPL, and set the option as Sender using your account.

D) Currency and COD Currency: Specify the currency the account will use for regular and COD transactions.

E) Address Validation: Allows you to choose which level of address validation you can use. Not only the address is validated, but take into account that FedEx detects residential areas, having impact in the charges and services to be used. If you are not sure of which level would be suitable for you, you can go in depth in this article.

F) Package type: Allows you to specify which Package type you will be using. It could be a specific one or a variable (user provided) depending on the case.

G) Sender name and Sender Company: Specify the Sender Name and Company (the latter is optional). You can also override the sender address (by default techShip will use the one defined on the source Carrier account) to an address different from the source. To do so, follow the steps from this article. 

Press Save to apply the changes. If the information is valid, you'll be able to process orders through it.

KNOWN ISSUES

Upon first time setup, FedEx might not set the Address Validation Services for your account.

FedEx shows a false flag error when this happens as you process the order, instead of what the real issue is.

If processing fails with 1000 - AUTHENTICATION ERROR, it means that you were faster to process the order than FedEx enabling the Keys, or that the Address Validation services have not been enabled by FedEx. Try processing later or reach your FedEx representative.

If it succeeds, proceed as usual with proof of work, void and delete.

SPECIFYING RATE SHOPPING SERVICE CODES (OPTIONAL)

If you are Rate Shopping with this account, you might want to specify which services you want be taken into consideration or excluded. Read this article to set up your inclusion/exclusion list.