Distribute Revenue

About Revenue Distribution

You can manually distribute revenue into any open accounting period. Manual distribution is allowed on auto-created revenue schedules and manually created revenue schedules.

Redistribute revenue schedule in the closed accounting period.

You can redistribute revenue schedules into open Accounting Periods. The offset revenue recognition will be generated automatically in the next open accounting if you choose the automatic distribution method. No matter how it's re-distributed, existing revenue event items in the closed accounting period keep the same, and Zuora generates corresponding new revenue event items in the open accounting period.

Suppose a portion of the redistribution date range falls into closed Accounting Periods. In that case, any revenue associated with closed Accounting Periods will be instead distributed to the next open Accounting Period, along with the offset revenue recognition.

Distribute revenue amounts when you need to:

Move undistributed revenue from an open-ended period to an open accounting period.
Manually distribute revenue on a subscription charge that uses a manual recognition rule.
Adjust revenue amounts in open accounting periods.

To distribute revenue, the following are required:

The revenue schedule is created.
The accounting period must be open.

You can distribute revenue through the Zuora UI or through REST APIs. The rest of this article explains how to distribute revenue using the Zuora UI.

See Distribute revenue across accounting periods or Distribute revenue by recognition start and end dates for more information on using REST API calls to distribute revenue.

You must have the Change Revenue Distribution permission to manually distribute revenue. See Finance Roles for more information.

How to Distribute Revenue

You can distribute revenue using the following methods:

Manually: Enter the new amounts of revenue for each accounting period. Check that the sum of the new amounts equals the revenue schedule amount.
Automatically: When you choose to "Automatically distribute all revenue using a date range', you will specify Recognition Start and Recognition End dates so that Zuora will automatically distribute the revenue evenly over each day of the date range using the daily recognition over time rule. The default transaction date rule is set to "recognize revenue over the recognition term regardless of when the transaction occurs" and the default rounding rule is set to round trailing. See Components and Configuration Options for more information on rule descriptions.

Specific recognition date: Distribute a fixed amount or percentage of the total amount on the specified recognition date. This is a good option for project or milestone-based revenue recognition, where you can recognize revenue upon approval of a completed phase in a service implementation project.

When generating revenue recognition reports for any given period, the last revenue distribution method used will become the default method at the time the report is generated. For example if manual revenue distribution was last used then subsequent revenue recognition reports will not apportion unassigned revenue automatically by date and reports with open accounting periods will show gaps until the revenue is manually assigned.

Access the Distribute Revenue Page

From the revenue schedule, click distribute revenue located at the top right. See Access Revenue Schedules for options on how to access a revenue schedule.

From the charge revenue summary, click distribute under the Action column. See Charge Revenue Summary for information on how to access a revenue schedule.

Distribute Revenue

Make your distribution changes.
Specify the revenue event type and write a note about the change.
Click distribute revenue when you are done. The revenue schedule appears. An audit trail of the distribution change is recorded in the Revenue Events table.

See the section that follows for a description of fields.

Revenue Distribution Field Descriptions

Basic Information Fields

In addition to information about the customer and subscription, the following fields are displayed as basic information:

Field	Description
Revenue Schedule Amount	The amount of revenue that you choose to recognize. Once you create a revenue schedule, you cannot change the revenue schedule amount. To adjust the amount, create another revenue schedule with a positive or negative amount that you would like to modify.
Reference ID	The ID is used to link a custom unlimited revenue schedule to an external transaction or entity.
Revenue Event Type	Specify the revenue event type that best describes the action. The following Zuora-defined revenue event types are supported: accounting period(s) created invoice canceled invoice posted invoice item adjustment created invoice item adjustment canceled revenue distributed credit memo posted (only available if you enable the Invoice Settlement feature) debit memo posted (only available if you enable the Invoice Settlement feature) credit memo cancelled (only available if you enable the Invoice Settlement feature) debit memo cancelled (only available if you enable the Invoice Settlement feature) If both the Invoice Settlement and Revenue features were enabled on your tenant prior to Zuora Release 230 (R230), August 2018, Zuora will create the credit memo cancelled or debit memo cancelled event type automatically when you cancel a posted credit memo or debit memo.
Notes	Additional information about the distribution. Limit: 2,000 characters

Revenue Distribution Fields

Field	Description
How do you want to distribute revenue?	Required. Select one of the following from the drop-down list: Manually distribute revenue across accounting periods: Choose this option to manually enter the amount of revenue to distribute into each open accounting period. Automatically distribute all revenue using a date range: Choose this option to automatically to distribute revenue based on the specified recognition start and end date. For example, this option may a good choice for revenue may need to be delayed by a specified period of time. Distribute revenue on a specific date: Choose this option to distribute an amount of revenue on a specified recognition date. For example, on completion of phase II of a 3-phased service implementation, an event is triggered from an external system. You can distribute a specified amount as recognized revenue in Zuora. If the revenue amount is $2,000 and the undistributed amount is $500, the amount recognized is calculated based on the distribution option you choose. Distribution options are: Fixed amount. Enter a specific amount, such as $666 of the $2,000. % of the total. Enter the percentage of the total revenue to distribute, such as 75% of $2,000. % of undistributed. Enter the percentage of undistributed revenue to distribute, such as 50% of $500.00. For this option, the default transaction date rule is set to "recognize revenue over the recognition term regardless of when the transaction occurs" and the default rounding rule is set to round trailing.
Accounting Period	Open accounting periods available for distributing revenue amounts. The accounting period in which the subscription was activated is displayed by default. Click Show previous accounting periods or Show next accounting periods to enter revenue amounts in other accounting periods.
Existing Amount	When creating a revenue schedule, only the Open-ended period is populated with the Revenue Schedule Amount. When redistributing revenue, this column represents the last saved revenue amount.
New Amount	As distribute revenue amounts into accounting periods, this amount is subtracted from the Open-ended amount. Enter the revenue amount for each accounting period. As you distribute revenue amounts into accounting periods, these amounts are subtracted from the Open-ended amount.
Difference	The difference between the Existing Amount and the New Amount. As you distribute revenue amounts into accounting periods, a negative amount for the Open-ended period show how much revenue has been distributed (removed from Open-ended).

Distribute Revenue from the Open-Ended Accounting Period into Newly-Created Accounting Periods

When you distribute revenue across a date range that does not have an accounting period defined, the revenue is placed in the Open-Ended accounting period. Once you create an accounting period, you can move revenue out of the Open-Ended accounting period into the accounting period you just created.

Navigate to Finance > Accounting Periods and click Distribute revenue from Open-Ended accounting period on the right-side pane under the Action section.

Any revenue in the Open-Ended accounting period that should be recognized in the new accounting period is distributed automatically. This operation does not affect revenue schedules from which you have manually distributed revenue, even if the revenue schedule still has remaining undistributed revenue. The remaining revenue must be distributed manually.

Revenue Distribution Calculation

Use case 1: Distribution logic for a monthly revenue recognition rule applied for a partial month

Consider the following revenue distribution logic:

Recognition Model	Recognition Term Start Date	Recognition Term End Date	Distribution	Rounding	Transaction Date
Billing - Monthly recognition over time	Start recognizing revenue from the Invoice Item Period Start	Start recognizing revenue from the Invoice Item Period End	Proration by Days	Round Trailing	Does not recognize revenue before the transaction occurs

Revenue Schedule:

Revenue Schedule Amount	Revenue Schedule Date	Recognition Start Date	Recognition End Date
`9600 JPY`	June 01, 2023	January 01, 2023	October 19, 2023

Revenue Distribution Result:

June 2023	July 2023	August 2023	September 2023	October 2023
`5,994 JPY`	`999 JPY`	`999 JPY`	`999 JPY`	`999 JPY`

Here is the calculation logic:

Total Days: From January 01, 2023 to October 19, 2023

which is, 292 days

Total Amount: 9600 JPY

Amount per Day: 9600/292 = 32 JPY; Remainder = 256 JPY

Amount for Partial Month: 19 days in October

which is, 19 days * 32 JPY = 608 JPY

Total Amount for Full Months: January 2023 to September 2023

which is, 9600 JPY - 608 JPY = 8992 JPY

Amount per Month: January 2023 to September 2023 = 9 months

which is, 8229 JPY / 9 = 999 JPY

And the remainder = 1 JPY

Add the remainder to the last month in this period,

which is, Sum of Amount for the partial month(19 days in October) and the remainder amount = 608 JPY + 1 JPY = 609 JPY

Since the revenue schedule date is June 01, 2023, the revenue recognition date for January 01, 2023 to May 31, 2023 is moved to June 2023.

Hence the amount for June 2023 is = 999 JPY * 5 + 999 JPY = 5994 JPY

Amount calculated for the rest of the full months = 999 JPY