Working with Customer Payments : Solatech, Inc.

Summary

This article explains how to process payments through the SalesPRO Software.

More Information

Payments can only be processed at the Sale or Order status. Payments cannot be recorded against a Quote. Multiple payments may be applied to a single order, and a single payment may be split among multiple orders. SalesPRO will track all payments and their allocations, and prompt when a credit balance exists.

A default payment method may be set in Application Settings.

SalesPRO does not keep full credit card or checking account numbers and security codes. For credit cards, it is recommended that only the last four digits are recorded along with the expiration date. Entry is optional.

The software does not process credit cards or checks; there is no connection to any financial institutions.

"Allocated" payments have been assigned to a sale or order. An "unallocated" payment is one that has been recorded for the customer, but has not been assigned to a Sale or Order. A credit balance occurs when one or more payments have "unallocated" amounts.

Defining Payment Methods

SalesPRO is delivered with basic payment methods predefined. Additional methods can be created at any time.

From the Maintenance tab, click on Manage Lists, then select Payment Methods.
A window will open with all existing payment methods.
Click New to create a method, Edit to modify, or Delete to remove.
For New and Edit, a window will open to name the method, and set the type as either "Credit Card" or "Other"
Click OK to save.

Recording Payments

Payments may be entered at any time, and at any point in the order cycle. If a payment is applied to a quote, the quote will be automatically converted to a sale before the payment is applied.

From the toolbar.

From the Home tab, select Customers, Sales, or Orders.
When the toolbar opens, from the list of available sales/orders, highlight the desired record.
Click the "Receive a Payment" icon.

From Order Entry (Edit window).

There are two ways to get to the payments function:

At the bottom right of the window, click on the "Payments:" hyperlink.
- Note: Processing a payment on a quote will automatically convert the quote to a sale first.
For Sales and Orders only, from the Actions tab, click on "Receive Payments".

Entering Payments

Whichever method is used, the same windows will open for entry of the payment.

First, the payment screen will appear.

"Order Payments" will show all payments allocated to this order.

Payments may be added (New) or, by highlighting an existing payment, deleted.

"New Payment" will open automatically for the first payment to be applied to a quote/sale/order; otherwise it opens when "New Payment" is selected (from above).

Enter the payment method from the list (these are the options described at the start of this article).
Card number, name and expiration are only used for credit cards. They are optional.
Enter the amount of the payment.
In the lower window, all sales and orders will be listed.
Click on the sale/order to receive the payment.
If there is only one entry, double-click the amount under "To Allocate", and the number will change to the amount of the payment entered above.
Otherwise, enter the amount of the payment on the selected line.
For examples like the one below, if you do not manually enter the payment amount in the To Allocate column next to the appropriate Sale or Order, you will get a message that says "You are recording a payment but not applying it to any sales/order...etc".
Make sure you allocate the amount to the appropriate Sale or Order before proceeding.
- Note that payments may be split between sales/orders with balances.
At the bottom of the window it is shown how much of the payment is Allocated, and how much is Unallocated. The Unallocated amount should be 0 before you click OK.
Click OK to apply the payment.

If the Order Payment window is now visible, click Close.

The payment total and new balance will be updated on the Order Entry window. Click Save.

Working With Credit Balances

When applying a payment, if the customer has a credit balance (all payments have not been allocated), the New Payment window will open with a prompt.

Click OK.
Click on "Allocate Credit".

The payment(s) with unallocated funds will appear in the upper window. Click on the payment to be used.
In the lower window, select the sale/order to which the funds are to apply. More than one may be selected.
Enter the amount to be allocated to each sale/order.
Click OK.

The payment total and new balance will be updated on the Order Entry window. Click Save.

Viewing Payments

All payments that have been processed for a customer are available from the Customer toolbar.

Click on Customers icon from the Home tab.
On the Customer Toolbar, click on "View Payments".
- Payments may be deleted.
- All allocations must be removed first.
- Deleting the payment does not refund the money to the customer.