Credit Control Introduction
The Access Credit Control module aims to simplify the potentially time-consuming task of debt collection by giving your Credit Controllers access to all the information they need in one straightforward working list.
When chasing debts, your Credit Controllers can quickly build an on-screen telephone chase list of Customers who have exceeded their credit limit or who have overdue invoices or both. This is the Chase Debtors list.
Contact, Balance and Credit Limit details are displayed for each record.
Details of outstanding transactions can be viewed on the screen whilst in conversation with the Customer.
Subject to the Credit Controller's Security Profile permissions, copy invoices and statements can be produced directly from the list.
You can send the personalised chase letters directly from the list which can include a list of outstanding invoices if required.
After the Customer has been contacted, details of promised payments can be added to the record and chase notes updated.
In addition to the Chase Debtors list, the Credit Control module enables you to:
Allocate debts to Credit Controllers by the debt status assigned to them.
Place Customers, or Suppliers, on stop.
Flag individual transactions as 'in dispute'.
Revise the Due Date and Anticipated Receipt or Payment Date for transactions.
Write off bad debts and reverse these write -off should this be necessary.
Cash Flow Forecast
The system keeps track of how long every invoice has been outstanding and, from this information, calculates the Anticipated Receipt date for each of your Customers. This enables a Cash Flow Forecast report to be produced, starting with your actual bank balance and projecting your future bank balance, based on outstanding invoices and the anticipated days for each outstanding invoice.
Setup
Security Profile:
Before you start working with the Credit Control module, you must review the Security Profile Settings of the Users who will be using the module.
In the User's Security Profile you can permit or restrict access to different parts of the module such as permitting copy invoices and statements to be produced.
System Settings:
On the Credit Control Options window:
You can set the Default Bad Debt Analysis code.
Define the number of days over the due date that defines a debt as being Overdue.
Create additional Debt Statuses that can be assigned to overdue debts and select the Credit Controller who will work with debts that have been given these statuses.
Provisional settings:
Before your Credit Controllers start to use the module you should:
Review the current status of the debts, using the option Change Debt Status to modify them if necessary.
Allocate your accounts to the Credit Controllers who will be working with them. This is done using the Credit Controller Utility found on the Data Utilities menu.
Check that a Credit Limit has been entered for each Customer. This is found on the Terms window opened from the Customer record.
Enter the Anticipated Days on the Terms window.
The system can calculate the number of days it takes each Customer to send payment for an invoice from past transactions; this is referred to as the Anticipated Days.
If there is no transaction history from which the Anticipated Days can be calculated, you should enter the expected Anticipated Days for each Customer.
Dispute flag
The Dispute flag can be set to indicate that a transaction is being disputed. In some areas of the software, this Dispute Flag is referred to as a Query Flag. Once set, a transaction will appear marked with an * (asterisk symbol).
You can set (or clear) the Dispute flag:
In some windows by clicking the Dispute button. This includes Bulk Receipts and Remittances.
In the small Terms window accessed from the transaction header window using the Terms button.
Setting this flag against sales transactions will help you to identify which transactions should not be chased with debtor letters.
Setting this flag against purchase transactions will act a reminder that the invoice should not be selected for allocation or payment.
Transactions that have the Dispute flag set will not display any Settlement Discount when viewed in the remittances list.
You can print a report of disputed transactions using the Overdue Invoices report for Sales Ledgers and Purchase Ledgers. This can be found under Overdue Invoices and setting the search Invoices menu in the simple search.