billing-automation

wshobson/agents · updated Apr 8, 2026

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$npx skills add https://github.com/wshobson/agents --skill billing-automation
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summary

Automated billing systems for recurring payments, invoicing, subscription lifecycle, and dunning management.

  • Manages complete subscription lifecycle including trial periods, activation, plan changes, cancellation, and pause/resume workflows
  • Handles failed payment recovery through configurable dunning workflows with retry schedules, customer notifications, and grace periods
  • Calculates prorated charges for mid-cycle plan upgrades, downgrades, and seat changes with day-based adjustments
skill.md

Billing Automation

Master automated billing systems including recurring billing, invoice generation, dunning management, proration, and tax calculation.

When to Use This Skill

  • Implementing SaaS subscription billing
  • Automating invoice generation and delivery
  • Managing failed payment recovery (dunning)
  • Calculating prorated charges for plan changes
  • Handling sales tax, VAT, and GST
  • Processing usage-based billing
  • Managing billing cycles and renewals

Core Concepts

1. Billing Cycles

Common Intervals:

  • Monthly (most common for SaaS)
  • Annual (discounted long-term)
  • Quarterly
  • Weekly
  • Custom (usage-based, per-seat)

2. Subscription States

trial → active → past_due → canceled
              → paused → resumed

3. Dunning Management

Automated process to recover failed payments through:

  • Retry schedules
  • Customer notifications
  • Grace periods
  • Account restrictions

4. Proration

Adjusting charges when:

  • Upgrading/downgrading mid-cycle
  • Adding/removing seats
  • Changing billing frequency

Quick Start

from billing import BillingEngine, Subscription

# Initialize billing engine
billing = BillingEngine()

# Create subscription
subscription = billing.create_subscription(
    customer_id="cus_123",
    plan_id="plan_pro_monthly",
    billing_cycle_anchor=datetime.now(),
    trial_days=14
)

# Process billing cycle
billing.process_billing_cycle(subscription.id)

Subscription Lifecycle Management

from datetime import datetime, timedelta
from enum import Enum

class SubscriptionStatus(Enum):
    TRIAL = "trial"
    ACTIVE = "active"
    PAST_DUE = "past_due"
    CANCELED = "canceled"
    PAUSED = "paused"

class Subscription:
    def __init__(self, customer_id, plan, billing_cycle_day=None):
        self.id = generate_id()
        self.customer_id = customer_id
        self.plan = plan
        self.status = SubscriptionStatus.TRIAL
        self.current_period_start = datetime.now()
        self.current_period_end = self.current_period_start + timedelta(days=plan.trial_days or 30)
        self.billing_cycle_day = billing_cycle_day or self.current_period_start.day
        self.trial_end = datetime.now() + timedelta(days=plan.trial_days) if plan.trial_days else None

    def start_trial(self, trial_days):
        """Start trial period."""
        self.status = SubscriptionStatus.TRIAL
        self.trial_end = datetime.now() + timedelta(days=trial_days)
        self.current_period_end = self.trial_end

    def activate(self):
        """Activate subscription after trial or immediately."""
        self.status = SubscriptionStatus.ACTIVE
        self.current_period_start = datetime.now()
        self.current_period_end = self.calculate_next_billing_date()

    def mark_past_due(self):
        """Mark subscription as past due after failed payment."""
        self.status = SubscriptionStatus.PAST_DUE
        # Trigger dunning workflow

    def cancel(self, at_period_end=True):
        """Cancel subscription."""
        if at_period_end:
            self.cancel_at_period_end = True
            # Will cancel when current period ends
        else:
            self.status = SubscriptionStatus.CANCELED
            self.canceled_at = datetime.now()

    def calculate_next_billing_date(self):
        """Calculate next billing date based on interval."""
        if self.plan.interval == 'month':
            return self.current_period_start + timedelta(days=30)
        elif self.plan.interval == 'year':
            return self.current_period_start + timedelta(days=365)
        elif self.plan.interval == 'week':
            return self.current_period_start + timedelta(days=7)

Billing Cycle Processing

class BillingEngine:
    def process_billing_cycle(self, subscription_id):
        """Process billing for a subscription."""
        subscription = self.get_subscription(subscription_id)

        # Check if billing is due
        if datetime.now() < subscription.current_period_end:
            return

        # Generate invoice
        invoice = self.generate_invoice(subscription)

        # Attempt payment
        payment_result = self.charge_customer(
            subscription.customer_id,
            invoice.total
        )

        if payment_result.success:
            # Payment successful
            invoice.mark_paid()
            subscription.advance_billing_period()
            self.send_invoice(invoice)
        else:
            # Payment failed
            subscription.mark_past_due()
            self.start_dunning_process(subscription, invoice)

    def generate_invoice(self, subscription):
        """Generate invoice for billing period."""
        invoice = Invoice(
            customer_id=subscription.customer_id,
            subscription_id=subscription.id,
            period_start=subscription.current_period_start,
            period_end=subscription.current_period_end
        )

        # Add subscription line item
        invoice.add_line_item(
            description=subscription.plan.name,
            amount=subscription.plan.amount,
            quantity=subscription.quantity or 1
        )

        # Add usage-based charges if applicable
        if subscription.has_usage_billing:
            usage_charges = self.calculate_usage_charges(subscription)
            invoice.add_line_item(
                description="Usage charges",
                amount=usage_charges
            )

        # Calculate tax
        tax = self.calculate_tax(invoice.subtotal, subscription.customer)
        invoice.tax = tax

        invoice.finalize()
        return invoice

    def charge_customer(self, customer_id
how to use billing-automation

How to use billing-automation on Cursor

AI-first code editor with Composer

1

Prerequisites

Before installing skills in Cursor, ensure your development environment meets these requirements:

  • Cursor installed and configured on your development machine
  • Node.js version 16.0+ with npm package manager (verify with node --version)
  • Active project directory or workspace where you want to add billing-automation
2

Execute installation command

Execute the skills CLI command in your project's root directory to begin installation:

$npx skills add https://github.com/wshobson/agents --skill billing-automation

The skills CLI fetches billing-automation from GitHub repository wshobson/agents and configures it for Cursor.

3

Select Cursor when prompted

The CLI will show a list of available agents. Use arrow keys to navigate and space to select Cursor:

◆ Which agents do you want to install to?
│ ── Universal (.agents/skills) ── always included ────
│ • Amp
│ • Antigravity
│ • Cline
│ • Codex
│ ●Cursor(selected)
│ • Cursor
│ • Windsurf
4

Verify installation

Confirm successful installation by checking the skill directory location:

.cursor/skills/billing-automation

Reload or restart Cursor to activate billing-automation. Access the skill through slash commands (e.g., /billing-automation) or your agent's skill management interface.

Security & Verification Notice

We perform automated surface-level scans (Gen AI Scanner, Socket, Snyk) during installation. These checks detect common vulnerabilities but do not guarantee complete security. Always review skill source code and verify the publisher's reputation before production use.

Skills execute code in your development environment. Always verify the publisher's identity, review recent commits, and test in isolated environments before production deployment.

List & Monetize Your Skill

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Use Cases

User Story & Requirements Generation

Create detailed user stories, acceptance criteria, and feature specs

Example

Generate user stories for 'password reset feature' with acceptance criteria, edge cases, and test scenarios

Reduce spec writing time by 50%, ensure comprehensive coverage

Competitive Analysis

Research competitors, compare features, identify gaps

Example

Analyze 5 competitor products, create feature comparison matrix, suggest differentiation opportunities

Complete competitive research in 2 hours instead of 2 days

Roadmap Prioritization

Evaluate features using frameworks (RICE, ICE, Kano) and create prioritized backlogs

Example

Score 20 feature ideas using RICE framework, generate prioritized roadmap with rationale

Make data-driven prioritization decisions faster

Stakeholder Communication

Draft PRDs, status updates, and stakeholder presentations

Example

Create executive summary of Q3 roadmap, monthly progress report, feature launch announcement

Save 3-5 hours/week on communication overhead

Implementation Guide

Prerequisites

  • Claude Desktop or compatible AI client
  • Access to product documentation and roadmap tools (Jira, Notion, etc.)
  • Understanding of product management frameworks (RICE, Jobs-to-be-Done, etc.)
  • Stakeholder contact information and communication channels

Time Estimate

30-60 minutes to see productivity improvements

Installation Steps

  1. 1.Install product management skill
  2. 2.Start with user story generation for known feature
  3. 3.Progress to competitive analysis: research 2-3 competitors
  4. 4.Use for roadmap prioritization: apply RICE/ICE scoring
  5. 5.Draft stakeholder communications and refine based on feedback
  6. 6.Build template library for recurring PM tasks
  7. 7.Share effective prompts with product team

Common Pitfalls

  • Not validating competitive research—verify facts before sharing
  • Accepting user stories without involving engineering team
  • Over-relying on frameworks without qualitative judgment
  • Not customizing outputs to company culture and communication style
  • Skipping stakeholder validation of generated requirements

Best Practices

✓ Do

  • +Validate research and competitive analysis with real data
  • +Collaborate with engineering when generating technical requirements
  • +Customize frameworks and templates to your company context
  • +Use skill for first drafts, refine with stakeholder input
  • +Document successful prompt patterns for PM tasks
  • +Combine AI efficiency with human judgment and intuition

✗ Don't

  • Don't publish competitive analysis without fact-checking
  • Don't finalize user stories without engineering review
  • Don't make prioritization decisions solely on AI scoring
  • Don't skip customer validation of generated requirements
  • Don't ignore company-specific context and culture

💡 Pro Tips

  • Provide context: company goals, constraints, customer feedback
  • Ask for alternatives: 'Show 3 ways to prioritize this roadmap'
  • Request stakeholder-specific formatting: 'Executive summary vs. engineering spec'
  • Use skill for 70% generation + 30% customization to company needs

When to Use This

✓ Use When

Use for user story writing, competitive research, roadmap prioritization, stakeholder communication, and PRD drafting. Best for reducing repetitive documentation and research work.

✗ Avoid When

Avoid for strategic product vision (requires deep customer empathy), pricing decisions (needs market and financial expertise), or when face-to-face customer discovery is more valuable than speed.

Learning Path

  1. 1Basic: user stories, feature specs, status updates
  2. 2Intermediate: competitive analysis, prioritization frameworks, PRDs
  3. 3Advanced: product strategy, go-to-market planning, OKR setting
  4. 4Expert: product vision, market positioning, business model innovation

Discussion

Product Hunt–style comments (not star reviews)
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general reviews

Ratings

4.463 reviews
  • Charlotte Desai· Dec 24, 2024

    Useful defaults in billing-automation — fewer surprises than typical one-off scripts, and it plays nicely with `npx skills` flows.

  • Fatima Gupta· Dec 24, 2024

    Solid pick for teams standardizing on skills: billing-automation is focused, and the summary matches what you get after install.

  • Charlotte Diallo· Dec 20, 2024

    billing-automation has been reliable in day-to-day use. Documentation quality is above average for community skills.

  • Charlotte Abebe· Dec 12, 2024

    We added billing-automation from the explainx registry; install was straightforward and the SKILL.md answered most questions upfront.

  • Noah Thompson· Nov 15, 2024

    billing-automation is among the better-maintained entries we tried; worth keeping pinned for repeat workflows.

  • Fatima Khanna· Nov 15, 2024

    We added billing-automation from the explainx registry; install was straightforward and the SKILL.md answered most questions upfront.

  • Maya Bansal· Nov 11, 2024

    billing-automation fits our agent workflows well — practical, well scoped, and easy to wire into existing repos.

  • Ama Rahman· Nov 3, 2024

    Solid pick for teams standardizing on skills: billing-automation is focused, and the summary matches what you get after install.

  • Hiroshi Sharma· Oct 22, 2024

    billing-automation has been reliable in day-to-day use. Documentation quality is above average for community skills.

  • Benjamin Gonzalez· Oct 6, 2024

    Keeps context tight: billing-automation is the kind of skill you can hand to a new teammate without a long onboarding doc.

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