Overview
Payment Plans are used to pay the outstanding amount, or part thereof, of one or more customer's invoices at regular intervals. Payment planscan be automated (using the customer's payment method) or manual.
The portion of the payable amount of an invoice that is covered by a payment plan will be excluded from invoice overdue events and automated payments. Users cannot allocate payments to this amount in the receive payment or allocate payment screens.
Prerequisites
The following prerequisites apply.
Payment Plans Module
For automated payment plans, the Automated Payments module must be configured and the customer requiring a payment plan will need to have a payment method configured and enabled. For more information, please see the article on configuring a customer's payment method.
Invoices
Payment Plans can only be applied against invoices that are approved and have an outstanding amount payable.
Invoices that have any disputed amounts cannot have payment plans applied against them. The dispute will need to be resolved prior to applying the payment plan.
Voiding, Reversing and Refunding Payments
Payments that are attached to payment plans cannot be be reversed, refunded or voided. Please see the payment reversal and void article for more information.
Off-Cycle Payments
There is no support for payments made to automated payment plans outside the schedule.
If there is an invoice that is partially covered by a payment plan, users can allocate a payment to this invoice but it cannot cover the amount of that invoice that is covered by the payment plan.
If users want to adjust the payment plan to account for this off-cycle payment, complete the following steps:
- Cancel the existing payment plan
- Manually allocate the payment to the invoice.
- Create a new payment plan.
Service Provider Global Default Settings
The following default settings can be used to define the behaviour of automated payment plans for a service provider. Emersion can set or adjust these for you upon request.
| Setting | Note |
|---|---|
| Days Retry | This setting defines for how many days the system will retry taking the payment and is overridden when the payment plan is created. If the payment attempt continues to fail by the time the limit is exhausted, the payment plan will automatically be cancelled. If a scheduled payment is unable to be collected for any reason (e.g. insufficient funds or expired card), the system will record this as a failed transaction attempt. |
| Maximum Retries | This setting defines how many attempts the payment plans module will make before cancelling the payment plan. This setting is overridden when the payment plan is being created. |
Payments that are system failed will automatically be retried on the following day, and do not count towards the failed transaction count.
This setting is separate to the Automated Payments account attribute and controls how failed payments are handled within the scope of the payment plan.
Payment Plans and Manual Payment Batches
Payment Plans supports creating payments for payment gateways that utilise the Manual Payment Batch module.
When the payment plan module needs to create a payment for a payment gateway that utilises the manual payment batch module, the system will look for a manual payment batch that:
- has not been exported at all
- was originally created by the payment plan process.
The new payment will be attached to the manual payment batch if such a manual batch has been located.
A new manual payment batch will be created if one cannot be located.
Payment Plan Statuses
| Status Name | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Active | The payment plan is currently in progress |
| Complete | The payment plan is complete and the customer has made all payments owing |
| Cancelled | The payment plan has been cancelled by a user or because the payment was unable to be collected. |