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How PNLCS Is Organized

Updated

If you've never used a billing panel, the vocabulary can be confusing. This page explains the main ideas in plain English and how they fit together.

The big picture

Client  ──places──▶  Order  ──generates──▶  Invoice  ──when paid──▶  Service (Active)
  │                                                                      │
  └── has contacts, tickets, domains                     runs on ──▶  Server (via a Module)

The core objects

Client

A client is a customer account — a person or company that buys from you. It holds the billing profile and everything they own (services, domains, invoices, tickets).

A login is a person who signs in to the client portal, and it is separate from the account: one account can have several logins (an owner, an accountant, a developer), each with its own permissions, and one login can belong to several accounts and switch between them. See Client Logins & Permissions.

A client can also have contacts — additional people (e.g. a technical contact and a billing contact) who receive the kinds of email you choose for them. Contacts do not sign in.

Product

A product is what you sell — a plan on your price list. "Starter Hosting — $5/month" is a product. Products are grouped into product groups (categories) that customers browse in the shop.

Order

An order is a customer's request to buy one or more products. Placing an order creates the order record and an invoice. An order starts Pending and becomes Active once accepted: usually automatically when its invoice is paid, or by you for products set to wait for an admin. It can also end as Cancelled or Fraud.

Invoice

An invoice is the bill. It lists what's owed and has a status such as Unpaid, Paid, Overdue or Cancelled (the full list of nine is in Products, Services, Orders & Invoices). Paying an invoice is what drives the rest of the system into motion.

Service

A service is the live thing the customer owns after they buy — the actual hosting account, VPS or subscription. A service has its own status (for example Pending, Active, Suspended, Terminated) and its own billing cycle: it renews and generates new invoices on schedule, independently of the original order.

Order vs Service — the key distinction

The order is the one-time act of buying. The service is the ongoing thing that lives on afterward and keeps billing. One order creates a service; that service then renews for months or years.

Server & Module

A server is a machine where hosting accounts are created. A module is the integration that talks to it (Panelica, cPanel, Plesk, DirectAdmin, HestiaCP, aaPanel, Proxmox, Vultr…). When a product is linked to a module (and optionally a server group), PNLCS can create, suspend, unsuspend and terminate accounts automatically on a server of that type.

See Servers & Modules.

Gateway

A payment gateway is how money comes in: Stripe, PayPal, Authorize.Net, Mollie, Razorpay, Tpay, iyzico, or bank transfer. See Payment Gateways.

Registrar

A registrar module registers and renews domains: Namecheap, ResellerClub, OpenProvider, Enom, HRD, OVH, DomainNameAPI, or Manual if you register names yourself. See Sell Domains.

Admin vs Client — two sides

PNLCS has two front doors:

  • Admin panel (/admin) — you and your staff manage everything here.
  • Client portal (/client) — your customers shop, pay invoices, open tickets and manage their services here.

Where to go next