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Troubleshooting Billing Automation

When something doesn't fire when you expect, work through the relevant problem below. If you can't resolve it, message Justin with the Project name, the Billing Month, and what you expected vs. what happened.

Problem 1: No Billing Cycle appeared on the 1st of the month​

Symptoms​

  • It's the 2nd or later, and the project you expected to bill this month has no new Billing Cycle item.
  • The Project's Linked Billing Cycles field doesn't show a new entry for this month.

Diagnosis steps​

Step 1: Check the Project's fields.

On the Project record, confirm all three of these:

  • Billing Date is filled in (two-digit DD format like 15)
  • Billing Cycles Complete is No
  • Project Manager and Accountant fields are populated

If any of those is blank or wrong, the cycle creator skipped the project. Fix the field and the next 1st-of-month run will pick it up.

Step 2: Check if it's actually a new project that just got created.

If the project was created after the 1st of this month, no cycle exists for this month — that's expected. The first cycle will appear on the next 1st-of-month run.

See Setting Up a New Project for Billing → "When does the first cycle fire?" for details.

Step 3: Check the Billing Cycles app for a duplicate that's mis-tagged.

Open the Billing Cycles app and filter by Linked Project = your project. If a cycle exists but it's tagged with the wrong Billing Month, the creator may have skipped this month thinking one already exists.

Step 4: If none of the above, message Justin.

Include: Project name, Billing Month you expected, and what's in the three fields above.

Problem 2: The Accountant didn't get the T-5 prompt​

Symptoms​

  • It's 5 business days before billing, and the Accountant has no task or @-mention for this cycle.

Diagnosis steps​

Step 1: Confirm the cycle's Status.

Open the cycle. Status must be Pending Draft for the T-5 prompt to fire. If it's already been moved past Pending Draft (e.g., someone bumped it to Draft Sent early), the T-5 prompt won't fire — and doesn't need to, because the Accountant has already moved on.

Step 2: Confirm today's date matches the T-5 Prompt Date.

The cycle has a T-5 Prompt Date field. The prompt only fires on the morning of that exact date. If today is one day off, it'll fire tomorrow (or fired yesterday).

Step 3: Confirm the Accountant field is set.

If the Accountant field on the cycle is blank, no task can be assigned. This usually means the Project's Accountant was empty when the cycle was created.

To fix: fill in the cycle's Accountant field, then manually create a task / send an @-mention this one time. From next month's cycle on, the value will copy correctly if you also fill in the Project's Accountant field.

Problem 3: The PM (or Accountant) didn't get pinged after Status changed​

Symptoms​

  • The Accountant flipped Status to Draft Sent (or the PM flipped to PM Reviewed), but no comment / task fired for the next person.

Diagnosis steps​

Step 1: Confirm Status actually changed.

Open the cycle and check Status. Sometimes a click looks like it landed but the change didn't save. Try changing Status to something else and back to verify the field is responsive.

Step 2: Check the corresponding timestamp field.

If Status really changed to Draft Sent, Draft Sent Timestamp should now be filled in with the date and time of the change. If it's blank, the status-change trigger didn't fire.

Similarly for PM Reviewed → PM Reviewed Timestamp should be filled in.

Step 3: Check the next person's user field on the cycle.

If Status = Draft Sent fired correctly but the PM got no @-mention, check the cycle's Project Manager field. If it's blank, there's no one to ping.

To fix: fill in the field, then bump Status back to Pending Draft and forward again to Draft Sent. The trigger will re-fire with the now-populated PM.

Step 4: Check the PM/Accountant's Podio notification settings.

If the field is filled in but the user says they didn't see the notification, ask them to check their Podio notification preferences (bell icon → settings). The @-mention generates a Podio notification, which may also email them depending on their preferences.

Problem 4: Status changed but the Project audit comment didn't appear​

Symptoms​

  • The Billing Cycle has the new @-mention comment for the next role.
  • But the Linked Project's activity stream doesn't show the corresponding audit comment.

Diagnosis steps​

Step 1: Make sure the cycle's Linked Project field is set.

The audit comment is posted to whatever's in the cycle's Linked Project field. If that's empty, no Project comment is posted.

Step 2: Refresh the Project page.

The comment is posted within seconds, but the Project page won't show it until you reload.

Step 3: Look at the bottom of the activity stream.

Some browsers truncate long activity streams. Scroll all the way down or use the Project's activity filters to find recent comments.

Problem 5: Final retainage submitted but the Project wasn't flagged​

Symptoms​

  • A cycle marked Final Retainage Billing? = Yes was moved to Status = Submitted.
  • The Linked Project's Billing Cycles Complete is still No.

Diagnosis steps​

Step 1: Confirm the cycle had Final Retainage Billing? = Yes BEFORE Status changed to Submitted.

If you flipped Final Retainage Billing to Yes after Status was already Submitted, the stop logic didn't have anything to react to (because the Submitted status change had already happened with the flag set to No).

Fix: Bump Status back to PM Reviewed, confirm Final Retainage Billing? = Yes, then change Status back to Submitted. The stop logic will fire on this second transition.

Step 2: As a fast workaround, flip the Project flag manually.

If you don't want to mess with status transitions, just open the Project and flip Billing Cycles Complete to Yes manually. That achieves the same effect (no more cycles), it just skips the audit comment that the automation would have posted.

See Final Retainage & Stopping a Project → "I forgot to flip the flag" for more.

Problem 6: The monthly digest email didn't arrive​

Symptoms​

  • It's the morning of the 1st (or the first business day if the 1st was a weekend), and no [YYYY-MM] Billing Cycle Summary email is in the inbox.

Diagnosis steps​

Step 1: Check spam / junk folders.

GlobiFlow-generated emails sometimes land in spam initially.

Step 2: Confirm the recipient list.

The digest goes to a hard-coded list (Justin, Emilina, Linda). If you're a new recipient and haven't been added to the list yet, you won't see it. Message Justin to be added.

Step 3: Confirm there were cycles last month.

If no Billing Cycles were created for the previous month at all, the email will still send but the table will be empty. (No cycles means no rows.)

Step 4: Check the time.

The digest sends at 8:00 AM on the first business day. If you're checking before 8:00 AM, just wait.

Problem 7: I'm seeing duplicate or unexpected cycles​

Symptoms​

  • Two cycles for the same project and same month.
  • A cycle for a project that should be billing-complete.

Diagnosis steps​

For duplicates:

  • One was probably created manually. Check the cycle's creation timestamp and the Notes field for clues.
  • Pick the correct cycle to keep, change the other's Status to Skipped.

For a cycle on a billing-complete project:

  • Check the Project's Billing Cycles Complete field. If it's somehow back to No, flip it to Yes. The cycle that was wrongly created can be set to Status = Skipped.

When to escalate to Justin​

Send a short note with:

  1. The Project name and Job #
  2. The Billing Month (e.g., 2026-05)
  3. What you expected to happen
  4. What actually happened (or didn't)
  5. Screenshots of the cycle's fields if relevant

This gives Justin everything he needs to look at the GlobiFlow logs without a follow-up question.