Wednesday, March 4, 2020

AutoPay Gets a Higher Daily Volume


Our sponsor bank has granted us a new higher processing limit.  The first and fifteenth of the month are always big days for loan payments, and those two days account for roughly 50% of the total monthly payment volume.  The payments scheduled for March 1st put is very close to our cap, and I reached out to the bank a few days in advance to let them know a temporary increase might be needed.

The bank raised the processing limit temporarily for the big batch on the 1st of March, and later approved our application to make the increase permanent.  This gives us space to grow for at least six more months before another limit increase is likely to be necessary.

Since AutoPay first started as an Alpha trial program about eighteen months ago, we’ve processed over a quarter million dollars in over 600 payments.  There are well over a hundred borrowers using AutoPay to get online access to their loans and to make ACH payments directly from their bank accounts.

All kinds of weird shenanigans have happened with payments.  Typos in payment information, bank accounts that were frozen to closed, a solid number of NSF returns.  As each new issue arose, we adjusted the system to accommodate the problem and everything went quite well.

At the same time, we got tons of feedback and questions from borrowers and lenders that helped us to design and improve the system to cover all the various ways that people on both sides would need access and control over payment information.

We’re starting a final development cycle now, and the end result will be AutoPay out of beta and in full production.  This last push will include the addition of record history tracking.  Every payment will be marked with how it was created and who was last to edit the payment.  Was the payment created by the borrower, lender or because of a recurring payment setting on the loan?  When was it created?  Who modified it, and when?  This information will be visible to both borrowers and lenders.  The AutoPay mechanisms in the Whitman Tech store will get a makeover and rearrangement, so lenders will be able to review upcoming payments and other usage details in their online account.  Within Moneylender, the AutoPay windows will get a final workover to make sure they’re highly polished and easy to use.

Internally, our payment batching mechanism is getting a new layer of robustness.  A new mechanism will formalize the process of confirming every batch file .  This mechanism also ties each line of a batch file directly to the matching AutoPay payment record.  A smoother flow to the collection and release of funds will make it easier to review every transaction and catch any potential problems before each batch is processed.

Having gone through an Annual ACH Processor Audit cycle, we have some very cool metrics on our system, and these metrics will be extended to allow lenders to see their volumes and counts from their WTech store account.

We’re very excited to be so close to the finish line for the production launch of the AutoPay service.

If you own or service loans, get Moneylender Professional.  Total control, no compromises, reasonable pricing.  Enroll in the AutoPay companion service to give your borrowers access to their loans online and accept electronic payments from US bank accounts.

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]

<< Home