Product Catalog
Manage your catalog of billable products and services — create articles, organise them into families, and configure billing methods for accurate invoicing.
Accessing the Catalog
Your product catalog is the central list of everything you bill for — subscriptions, hardware, labour, telecom services, and more. Each entry in the catalog is called an article.
Navigate to Configuration → Catalog to view and manage your articles. By default, a new BlueRockTEL instance includes a set of example articles to help you get started. Delete any that are not relevant to your business by clicking the trash icon next to the article.
Creating Articles Efficiently
You will build up your catalog over time. Rather than creating every article from scratch, BlueRockTEL offers a few shortcuts:
Duplicate an existing article
This is the fastest approach. Find an article similar to the one you need, duplicate it, and then modify the designation, price, or billing method as required. This ensures all configuration options carry over correctly.
Use template articles
Create one or more articles prefixed with "template" (or "modele") for each common article type. When you need a new article, duplicate the appropriate template and adjust the details. This saves time and reduces configuration errors.
Search and sort
Use the Search field at the top of the catalog to find articles quickly. Click any column header to sort the list — useful when you have hundreds of articles and need to find one by name, family, or price.
Mandatory Parameters
Every article requires at least three fields before it can be saved:
- Designation — the article name as it will appear on quotes and invoices
- Tax rate — the applicable VAT rate
- Family / subfamily — the category the article belongs to (see below)
Families and Subfamilies
Families group your articles into logical categories (e.g. "Telephony", "Internet", "Hardware", "Labour"). Subfamilies provide a second level of organisation within each family.
To configure families, navigate to Configuration → Articles: families.
Tip: Consult your accountant about how to structure families and subfamilies. They often map directly to your chart of accounts, so getting this right early saves effort at accounting export time.
- Click the hamburger button (three horizontal lines) next to a family to create subfamilies within it
- Click "+" to add additional families at the top level
- To move an article to a different family, open the article's edit page and change the family assignment there
Activation
Every article has an Activation checkbox. An article must be activated before it can be used in folders, quotes, or invoices. Deactivated articles remain in the catalog for reference but cannot be added to new folders.
Billing Type
Each article must be assigned a billing type:
- Initial (one-time) — billed once when the service is set up or the product is delivered. Used for setup fees, hardware purchases, one-off labour charges, etc.
- Recurring — billed every billing cycle for as long as the service is active. Used for subscriptions, monthly licences, and telecom services that include CDR-based consumption.
Important: Setting the correct billing type at creation time prevents errors when adding articles to folders later. An article configured as "Initial" will only be billed once, even if it sits in a recurring billing section.
Rules to Keep in Mind
Following a few simple rules will save you from billing mistakes:
- Never change an article's designation after it has been used in a folder. Changing the name retroactively affects the text displayed on all existing quotes and invoices that reference that article. If you need a different name, create a new article instead.
- Price changes do not propagate to existing folders. Updating an article's price in the catalog only affects future uses. Articles already placed in folders retain the price that was set at the time they were added.
- Do not change the billing method on CDR-related articles without guidance from BlueRockTEL support. CDR articles have specific rating configurations that can break if the billing method is altered.
Internal Reference
The Internal reference field lets you add a keyword or code that does not appear on any customer-facing document (quotes, invoices, etc.) but is searchable in the catalog. Use it to tag articles with an internal product code, a supplier reference, or any keyword that helps your team find the article quickly.
The "Refact" Billing Method
For telecom resellers, the Refact billing method is particularly useful. It reprises the supplier's billing formula and adds a defined margin on top. The margin percentage is configured in the folder parameters, so the same catalog article can produce different prices depending on the folder it is placed in.
Next Steps
Once your catalog is set up, you are ready to create folders and start billing. See Folders & Configuration to learn how to build client folders using your catalog articles.
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