Raw

**Subject:** Approve Big Chief’s monthly electronic settlement – with data‑supply and balancing conditions  

**Situation** – Finance currently settles each delivery ticket individually for Big Chief (account 8306), requiring a separate payment for every outlet‑date combination.  

**Complication** – Big Chief proposes to replace this with a single prepaid monthly payment accompanied by an electronic file of all tickets. To do so, the file must contain the parent number, outlet number, ticket number, amount and delivery date – data that Big Chief may not be able to provide for the first two identifiers.  

**Question** – Should we accept Big Chief’s proposed monthly electronic settlement?  

**Answer** – Yes – we can support the proposal provided we (1) supply any missing parent/outlet identifiers from our master file, (2) require Big Chief to balance the file against its cheque before submission, and (3) process the monthly file through the existing national‑accounts system to generate the billing records.  

**Why**  

1. **Data completeness** – If Big Chief cannot furnish the parent and outlet numbers, Finance will add them from the customer master file, ensuring the file meets the required format.  
2. **Balanced submission** – Big Chief will build an extraction program, send the file to Data Processing together with a detailed cheque listing; Finance will verify that the file total and cheque total net to zero before acceptance.  
3. **Seamless integration** – Once balanced, the monthly file will run through the national‑accounts cash‑receipt system, automatically matching ticket numbers to statement history and producing the correct billing records.  

**What I need now:** Management sign‑off to proceed with the above conditions, no later than [date].