1.4.10 Prospect Accounts

Modified on Thu, 21 Jul, 2022 at 5:51 PM

1.4.10 Prospect Account Getting Started Checklist:

Prospect Account Summary
Prospect Account Activity
Prospect Statements
Prospect Invoices
Prospect Charges
Prospect Payments (& Refunds)
Prospect Adjustments
Prospect Payment Plans
Prospect Funding
Prospect Credit Cards
Prospect Journal Entries
Home > Accounts
Institution Config > Accounts

Note: Some financial configuration options and summary accounts refer to Students instead of Prospects in this section because ampEducator treats all records as potential Students. The Prospect status is just a flag in the Student table.

1. Prospect Account Summary

Each Prospect has an Account Summary at the top of the Prospect Account tab. Amounts are colour coded RED for amounts owing and GREEN for paid 0.00 or if there is a Credit owing to Prospect it will be represented as (-1000.00)

Account Balance is the overall amount to be collected.
Total Due as per Due Date set on all Charges / Invoices to current date.
1. Current Due / 30 / 60 / 90+
2. Unapplied Payments are payments received but not applied to Charges/Invoices
PP (Payment Plan) Balance is the overall PP amount to be collected.
Total Due as per Due Date set on all PP items to current date
1. Current Due / 30 / 60 / 90+
Funding Balance is the overall Funding amount to be collected.
Funding Due as per Due Date set on Funding items to current date.
1. Individual amounts to be collected by Funding (Add Funding under Institution Config > Accounts > Funding).

Note: There is also a rarely used, but sometimes necessary "Recalculate Balances" Button that can force ampEducator to update any transactions that may not be recognized due to out of order operations.

2. Prospect Account Activity

Below the Summary is the Activity section which is a running total of all transactions by date for the Prospect Account. There are various shortcut items listed in the Activity section to save time scrolling down or using the Menu to jump to the section. The most commonly used New Payment Button is highlighted in Green followed by Activity > More Actions shortcuts for other commonly used transactions; Generate Statement, New Charge, New Adjustment, New Funding, New Invoice and Process Refund. You will notice to the right of each item there is a "RT" column which stands for "Running Total" and all of the columns in the Activity are sortable ascending or descending. You can also Filter and Export the Activity using the common UI found in ampEducator:

3. Prospect Statements

Prospect can be generated / emailed Statements on demand or automatically each month on the date you select. If you select automatic Statements only Students with a balance owing will be generated/emailed. Automated Statements as well as Statement ID numbers and fine print that can be customized in the Institution Config > Accounts > Defaults section.

4. Prospect Invoices

Your Institution may not use Invoices, and if this is the case then skip to Charges. You can use Invoices and Charges in ampEducator at the same time, although most institutions use one or the other. This entirely depends on your Accounting and how you currently operate your institution. Otherwise, Invoices can be thought of as basically just a group of Charges (line items).

There are several fields, icons and key pull down menus that control how Invoices work in ampEducator:

Invoice ID. This can be customized in Institution Config > Accounts > Defaults > Invoice ID.
Date. This defaults to current date.
Due Date. This defaults to current date, can be set to any number of future days automatically.
Notes. Optional.
Add New Item. The + sign allows you to manually add Invoice line items, the drop down arrow provides access to predefined fees by Enrolled Course Fee, Enrolled Program Fee, Course Template Fee, Session Fee, Form Fee or Other Fees you have assigned. These predefined fees will auto-populate the following if you wish to save time by adding them manually:
1. Account. Pulldown to select the appropriate Revenue Account. For most Institutions, Tuition, Registration Fees, Books & Materials and Other fees need to be tracked against specific Revenue Accounts and kept as separate line items.
2. Description. This helps the Student understand the line item in case the Account is generic in nature.
3. Rate. This is the Amount (pre-tax) for the line item.
4. Qty. It's rare to have a quantity, but required for Invoices. The default is 1.
5. Taxes. (Multiple Taxes can be added and customized under Institution Config > Accounts > Taxes).
6. Associated Program. For tracking, reporting and tax purposes.
7. Associated Course. For tracking, reporting and tax purposes.
8. Academic Session. Defaults to current session, can be edited
Undo and Save (Check). To apply the line item check the green check box to the right.

Click Save to update you Invoice changes. Once you are done with adding line items to your Invoice, Click Close.

Your Prospect Invoice will now appear in 'Draft' Status. This allows you to continue to work on Invoice without actually posting them to the Prospect Account. If you are done with the Invoice, then click the checkbox to the right to Post it to the Prospect Account:

The Invoice will switch from 'Draft' Status to 'Pending' Status and the Balance for the Invoice will appear in Red and added to the overall balance and Activity section for the Prospect:

5. Prospect Charges

If you don't use Invoices, then Charges is the alternative to billing Prospect fees. Similar to Invoices, Charges can be predefined or entered manually. Again, for most Institutions Tuition, Registration Fees, Books & Materials and Other fees need to be tracked against specific Revenue Accounts and kept separate. You can also track Charges against programs or courses just like Invoice line items:

6. Prospect Payments (& Refunds).

Payment are applied against Invoices and Charges. When you add Payments you can select the Invoice, Charge or Auto Apply the Payment based on order of due date for the Invoice or Charge. You can apply the Payment to a specific Charge, Funding Source and/or Payment Plan all at once.

Please Note: Payment Type Default allows you to simple track that a payment was made. You can process a credit card if you select Payment Type Online and have a payment processor configured with your ampEducator account under Institution Config > Accounts > Online Payments. We support the following payment gateway providers. However, we can add any merchant on request:

Authorize.net
Banquest
iATS
Moneris
NMI
Paypal
Square
First Data - Payeezy

Once you have selected the appropriate options to record the payment you can click Add. The payment will now appear in your payments list for the Prospect. You can see that all of the Payment was applied and no funds are left over (Remaining). There are some cases when the Prospect may have overpaid and you can leave that as pending until the next Charge or Invoice is added. Then you can return to the payment and expand it by clicking the (+) sign to the left to apply the overpayment to the new Invoice or Charge.

You will notice icons to the right of the Payment these include Payment Refund.

If a mistake was made, you can correct items by expanding on them to remove by clicking (X) and applying the correct related item or to reverse a refund.

7. Prospect Adjustments

Adjustments can be made to Prospect Accounts when required. To record a New Account Adjustment click New Adjustment. Enter the details to add a new account adjustment. A Debit A/R is similar to a charge on the account / invoice. A Credit A/R is similar to a payment on the account / invoice. It can optionally be applied to a charge. You can also apply a Refund A/R which is similar to a payment refund except it's applied directly to the account. It can optionally be applied to a payment.

8. Prospect Payment Plans

Prospects can be assigned payment plans to track future payment arrangements. These payments can be establish in 6 different ways:

a. More Actions > Add Payment Plan Item

Under Payment Plans, next to New Payment Plan is the More Actions > Add Payment Plan Item. This function will add Payment Plan Items one at a time. ampEducator will display the current balance owing for the current date. You can change this to be any number you like along with the date by clicking on the pencil icon to the right to edit.

Note: Auto Pay From Saved allows you to process a Prospect Credit Card saved on file (you must also have Institution Config > Accounts > Online Payments set up as well). See Student Credit Cards section for more information.

b. Divided by Weekly

This function will add Payment Plan Items based on the settings you enter. ampEducator will display the current balance owing. You can change this to be any number you like along with the date by clicking and editing the fields as required. A preview of what you have entered will appear below.

Note: Apply Existing Payments will attempt to grab any available unapplied payments that have been made to the plan to save time.

c. Divided by Monthly

This function works the same as (d) Divided by Weekly, except that it uses months rather than weeks.

d. Divided by Quarterly

This function works the same as (d) Divided by Weekly, except that it uses quarters rather than weeks.

e. Use Existing Absolute Plan

This function must be defined in Institution Config > Students > Plans > Add New Payment Plan first before it can be used. Clicking on New Payment Plan allows you to Name the Payment Plan and select Absolute Type plan.

Absolute Type: The amounts you specify will represent actual amounts owed. If the invoice total is less than the payment plan total, the payment plan will be truncated.

Once the plan name and type have been selected, they will appear in the List. Click the + icon to the left of the plan name you added to view or add new Plan items using the icons to the right.

Clicking Add Item will launch a modal window to add Plan items. Entering the parameters will define the payment plan as a template that can be used later:

Example: If you wanted to add a plan of 3 payments of $500 every 2 weeks you could add these using Days.

This would then become a template that you can add to re-use with Prospects. The first date would be the date you select when you add the plan to the Prospect.

f. Use Existing Percentage Plan

The Percentage (of Total) Plan also needs to be set up in Institution Config > Students > Plans > Add New Payment Plan before it can be used.

Percentage Type: The amounts you specify will represent a percentage of the invoice total.

Enter a name for the plan and select Percentage of Total. The plan will appear in the List, expand the Plan items by clicking on the + icon to the left of the Plan name, and click Add Item to add items to the plan using the icons to the right.

This launches a modal window which you can use to configure your percentage plan items.

Example: If you wanted the Prospect to pay 25% of the total amount owing (or any other amount you enter) every 2 weeks (4 times total) then you could do that by entering 25% every 14 days of the total 4 times. The first date would be 0 days if you wanted the plan to start on the same date you add it to the Student.

When you return to the Student Profile > Accounts > Payment Plan > Add New Payment Plan, you can now select Use Percentage Plan, select the Plan name you entered and configure the parameters. The Plan will preview what you have entered below to confirm, then you can click Add to add the plan to the Prospect.

Note: You can also edit the plan items once they are added to the Prospect:

9. Prospect Funding

Prospect may receive additional Funding for their education from various sources other than self paying. ampEducator provides the ability to track these Funding sources separately from Payment Plans. Funding Sources allow you to specify a date and amount that you expect Funding to be received for a Prospect. In order to track Funding types they must first be added under Institution Config > Accounts > Funding. Click New Funding Source and add Funding Source Code and Source Name. The Funding Sources you add will then appear in the Account Summary for all Prospects and will be available to assign expected Funding amounts and dates:

When payments come in they can be recognized against these Funding Sources to track them by selecting the Funding Source:

Overall Funding can be tracked under Home > Accounts > Funding:

10. Prospect Credit Cards

In order to use Prospect Credit Cards function, you must configure a merchant account (payment gateway) with recurring credit card / hosted vault option enabled under Institution Config > Accounts > Online Payments. Payment gateway 'Vaults' are used to store credit cards securely (no card information is stored in ampEducator) to allow ampEducator to process payments with a recurring billing feature linked to Payment Plans, and can also be used for non-recurring transactions so your Prospects don't need to re-enter their information each time they make a payment.

Please Note: ampEducator currently supports the following payment gateway providers.. However, we can add any merchant on request:

Authorize.net
Banquest
iATS
Moneris
NMI
Paypal
Square
First Data - Payeezy

Staff are able to manually add, update or remove a credit card for any Prospect and/or use the saved card on file to process payments in accordance with the credit card authorization policy agreement that should be arranged with your Prospects in advance. A credit card authorization form is signed by a cardholder to grant a merchant permission to charge their credit card. The form is used to give businesses the ongoing authority to charge the cardholder on a recurring basis and prevent and deal with chargebacks. A credit card authorization form is one way to protect yourself against Chargebacks or charge disputes. If you have a signed document from the cardholder that gives you permission to charge their card for services rendered, you ability to prove to the card issuer that you were authorized in the case of any Chargebacks is much less complicated. You can use Home > Contracts in ampEducator to create an authorization Form that you can send to Prospects to agree and sign.

Once you have configured the Online Payments config in ampEducator, to add a credit card simply enter the card credentials into the and click Store Card:

Prospect can save a credit card when making a payment for future use and remove credit cards (if the option is enabled under Institution Config > Accounts > Online Payments: Saved Credit Cards = Checked Yes, Students can Delete) securely using the Student Portal. Note: You will have to convert the Prospect to Student to allow them to use the Student Portal.

11. Prospect Journal Entries

ampEducator uses double entry bookkeeping. Double-entry bookkeeping, in accounting, is a system of book keeping where every entry to an account requires a corresponding and opposite entry to a different account. The double-entry system has two equal and corresponding sides known as debit and credit. The left-hand side is debit and the right-hand side is credit. These entries are stored in a Journal and the Prospect specific entries can be found in the Prospect Journal Entries. If you wish to review all Prospect Entries these are found under Home > Account > Journal (Note: Admin Role is required to access this section in the Home Tools).

13. Home > Accounts

If you would like to review all Transactions in one place including summary reports and other useful tracking tools you can access this information under Home > Accounts. (Note: Admin Role is required to access this section in the Home Tools).

14. Institution Config > Accounts

Before using the Accounts in ampEducator to manage your transactions with Prospects, it is important to review the Institution Config > Accounts section to ensure you have the correct settings in place. (Note: Admin Role is required to access Institution Config).