Automatic Debits - UK

Paul_Hackworth

Member
I'd be grateful to hear from any users who have experience of using the Auto Debits functionality in E1 to collect payments from UK customers by Direct Debit. Specifically, I'm wondering if anyone's managed to use this functionality without significant customisation, as the standard functionality doesn't seem to fit "common business practice" in the UK - for example:

1. The UK BACS system allows you to submit payment instructions to the bank up to 30 days in advance of the payment date - but in E1, you have to finalise the Auto Debits batch in order to produce the payment instruction file for the bank, and this process also sets the AR invoices to status "P"(aid), when in fact they may not be paid for up to 30 days.

2. The UK BACS system allows payments to be recalled up to a certain cut-off point prior to the payment date. But in E1, the AR invoices are already flagged as "P"(aid) by the time you've produced the payment instruction file for the bank - it would be better if these AR ledger items were put into some kind of "processing" status (similar to the "#" in AP) so that changes can be made up to the date of actual payment, subject to appropriate controls.

If anyone out there is using Auto Debits for UK customers, it would be great to hear how you've managed it.
 
Autodebits can be problematic when there is a delay in processing. You cannot simply leave the batch of autodebits unprocessed, because the payitems are not flagged "in process". If you run the process again, you can include the same payitem in multiple autodebit batches.

If you are not using the draft processing feature, you might be able to use it instead because there are several intermediate steps before the invoice is closed. If you have high volumes of invoices, this may not be practical.
 
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