Features checklist for WHMCS->Blesta migration

[Himax]

Hello,

I'm wishing to dump my lifetime license of WHMCS (I own 2 of them, if anybody is interested). But would like to check if some features I need are implemented in Blesta, mainly to comply with EU rules and taxes and our special requirements.

Here's a list:

• Proforma invoicing and separate invoice numbering for proforma and invoices. Perhaps proforma invoice only for selected customers (or invoice only for selected customers).
• EU vat rules, VAT and personal fiscal codes for physical persons. Bonus would be vies check on national VAT numbers to enable/disable VAT on each invoice.
• Freezing of the invoice once committed, including the header, address etc, while allowing proforma invoices to be amended until transformed into real invoices.
• Domain registrars: Enom, ResellerClub.
• Billing of full month on prorata services for the first month, even if the service starts during the month
• One invoice per month per customer, on a given day (1st of the month for example) which includes all the services accrued during a month, even if their start day differs.
• Pre or Post billing: Bill one month in advance or at the end of the month based on customer and/or service.
• Prepaid / refill accounts

Thank you

[Aitor]

Did you finally move to Blesta? I also have similar requirements.

[Himax]

I tried hard, but still stuck with WHMCS. Blesta is very nice, and the migration script does 90% of the work. However, the issues above still remain and prevent me from using Blesta in the EU.

In know that some of the points in my original post are not into WHMCS too and that their implementation required me to write some code for WHMCS, but I'm not in a position to do so again for Blesta.

[Aitor]

It seems that for now we are still captives of WHMCS. I also think Blesta could be a better alternative but I'm afraid something could be wrong after the import.

[Paul]

7 hours ago, Aitor said:

It seems that for now we are still captives of WHMCS. I also think Blesta could be a better alternative but I'm afraid something could be wrong after the import.

Have you installed the trial recently or attempted an import? If so, which specific items are you concerned about? Many of the things mentioned by the OP in this thread are implemented. Like Enom, ResellerClub, Freezing invoices, VIES VAT, and more.. I only skimmed it.

[Aitor]

Good news then! thank you.

The last attempt I tried was in december. Maybe I'll try again in august. I think it will be better to wait until the end of a fiscal year but perhaps I try it before.

[Paul]

50 minutes ago, Aitor said:

Good news then! thank you.

The last attempt I tried was in december. Maybe I'll try again in august. I think it will be better to wait until the end of a fiscal year but perhaps I try it before.

If you have any questions please let us know. Also, there's a link to join our Discord server in the forum navigation, the community can be very helpful.

[DavidD2]

Hi,

I missed the Discord chat today, so I decided to post this here.

I did a trial import of my WHMCS database a few days ago.  The results were favorable and I'd say it puts Blesta at ~90%++ complete.

A few questions and observations:

1) We use Stripe primarily.  The import of my Stripe keys was fine.  The import is also good at enabling the billing modules I need.  Looking in the Blesta database, I see the Stripe cust and card ids in the table "accounts_cc".   Am I correct to assume these customers are ready to bill via Stripe?   Meaning, Stripe only needs these two variables, so it's good to go?

2) After the import my WHMCS administrator login did not work.   The account was imported, i can see my username in the database, I can see a password hash in the database for my username, but my password didn't work.   My primary concern is customers passwords don't work.   I did set legacy passwords and algo to "whmcs" in the config file.   Unfortunately, other than my admin password, I didn't have a customer account to test with.  I'm just curious if you have seen admin logins not working after import.   

3) The imported invoices are largely correct.  It handles normal charges and credits properly.   I did notice that it did not handle refunds correctly.  So there was/is ~80 invoices that had refunds in the past that I'll need to correct manually.  No biggie.

4) The import sets up packages properly.   It did not setup add-on packages and it does not adjust prices on customers that do not pay the standard package price.  For example, we have an add-on for firewall and an add-on for backup.  We'll need to manually create these and then add them to the customers.   As for the non-standard pricing, we'll need to manually adjust these on the customers that do not pay full price.

Again, it's pretty good and gets us to a reasonable position to switch from WHMCS to Blesta in a reasonable amount of time.  If you have suggestions/answers on any of the above, it would be greatly appreciated.  I'm going to do another import after cleaning out a bunch of ancient data from our WHMCS database and also add test client accounts so I can verify password importation works.
 

[DavidD2]

22 hours ago, DavidD2 said:

Hi,

I missed the Discord chat today, so I decided to post this here.

I did a trial import of my WHMCS database a few days ago.  The results were favorable and I'd say it puts Blesta at ~90%++ complete.

A few questions and observations:

1) We use Stripe primarily.  The import of my Stripe keys was fine.  The import is also good at enabling the billing modules I need.  Looking in the Blesta database, I see the Stripe cust and card ids in the table "accounts_cc".   Am I correct to assume these customers are ready to bill via Stripe?   Meaning, Stripe only needs these two variables, so it's good to go?

2) After the import my WHMCS administrator login did not work.   The account was imported, i can see my username in the database, I can see a password hash in the database for my username, but my password didn't work.   My primary concern is customers passwords don't work.   I did set legacy passwords and algo to "whmcs" in the config file.   Unfortunately, other than my admin password, I didn't have a customer account to test with.  I'm just curious if you have seen admin logins not working after import.   

3) The imported invoices are largely correct.  It handles normal charges and credits properly.   I did notice that it did not handle refunds correctly.  So there was/is ~80 invoices that had refunds in the past that I'll need to correct manually.  No biggie.

4) The import sets up packages properly.   It did not setup add-on packages and it does not adjust prices on customers that do not pay the standard package price.  For example, we have an add-on for firewall and an add-on for backup.  We'll need to manually create these and then add them to the customers.   As for the non-standard pricing, we'll need to manually adjust these on the customers that do not pay full price.

Again, it's pretty good and gets us to a reasonable position to switch from WHMCS to Blesta in a reasonable amount of time.  If you have suggestions/answers on any of the above, it would be greatly appreciated.  I'm going to do another import after cleaning out a bunch of ancient data from our WHMCS database and also add test client accounts so I can verify password importation works.
 

If anyone sees this in the future:

1.  Imported Stripe information from WHMCS is ready to bill.   You need to choose the currencies in the module setup and then you can charge cards using existing stored CC information (Stripe tokens).  Tested today and works.

2)  My administrator login still did not work, but test client accounts I added before export from WHMCS did work.

 

[DavidD2]

#3:  On invoices with refunds after importation via the WHMCS importer (causing overdue invoices in Blesta) :  It's more involved and largely is related to our WHMCS customer's final invoices or SLA credits given over the years.   If a refund is given to a customer on an invoice, and the invoice is marked paid/voided, WHMCS considers the paid or voided invoice as closed.   Even though there is a technically a balance.

While this does require manual correction, the manual correction isn't needed on Blesta...  The correction should occur on WHMCS.  

After adding a line item to the WHMCS to reflect the refund to the customer, Blesta is happy.   

- The issue with the importer not applying multiple payments on a WHMCS invoice was related to credits which was also resolved by adding line items to subtract money owed on the invoices and removing the WHMCS credits.   WHMCS credits being applied to invoice creates a transaction that is visible at the bottom, but the invoice itself is never marked while a line item reflecting the credit.  WHMCS just has the transaction and marks the invoice paid.   Blesta appears to want an actual line item.   

All of issue #3 can largely be attributed to the sloppy accounting that is allowed by WHMCS.   While it all "just works" it's by no means clean accounting.  

In summary, my original list is largely resolved and I hope my posts help someone in the future. 

 

[Frazzle]

On 10/12/2024 at 8:05 PM, DavidD2 said:

#3:  On invoices with refunds after importation via the WHMCS importer (causing overdue invoices in Blesta) :  It's more involved and largely is related to our WHMCS customer's final invoices or SLA credits given over the years.   If a refund is given to a customer on an invoice, and the invoice is marked paid/voided, WHMCS considers the paid or voided invoice as closed.   Even though there is a technically a balance.

While this does require manual correction, the manual correction isn't needed on Blesta...  The correction should occur on WHMCS.  

After adding a line item to the WHMCS to reflect the refund to the customer, Blesta is happy.   

- The issue with the importer not applying multiple payments on a WHMCS invoice was related to credits which was also resolved by adding line items to subtract money owed on the invoices and removing the WHMCS credits.   WHMCS credits being applied to invoice creates a transaction that is visible at the bottom, but the invoice itself is never marked while a line item reflecting the credit.  WHMCS just has the transaction and marks the invoice paid.   Blesta appears to want an actual line item.   

All of issue #3 can largely be attributed to the sloppy accounting that is allowed by WHMCS.   While it all "just works" it's by no means clean accounting.  

In summary, my original list is largely resolved and I hope my posts help someone in the future. 

 

Thanks for sharing your experience. I am also considering moving to Blesta, but am worried about migration. Would be nice if Blesta could do the migration to help us make the switch.