Collecting Customer Invoice Payment Through ACH

This article explains how to collect payments from customers using ACH direct debit.

This feature is a separate Addon that must be activated on your account first and some set up is required with your bank. Contact your bank for details. Your bank might have specific requirement on the ACH submission which requires Versa to customize.

The automated clearing house (ACH) is an electronic funds-transfer system that facilitates payments in the U.S.  Versa Cloud can generate ACH file for electronic payments. Check with you bank to see if it can accept ACH files. Each bank might have its own specific requirements on how the ACH file is uploaded and the content of the ACH file. Contact your bank representatives for more information. The ability to generate ACH file is tied to payment batch for suppliers.

You have to specify your bank details under Setup, EFT/ACH bank information.  Enter the necessary information in order to generate the file. If your bank allow you to upload the file via SFTP, you can check the checkbox upload via SFTP. Then enter the details for the SFTP site. The SFTP details must be obtained from your bank first.

Make sure for each customer to be collected via ACH, you have their bank detail entered into their customer records.

To collect from customers using ACH, you use the payment receipt batch feature in Versa.

You would create a payment for each invoice to be paid under ACH and put them into a receipt batch.

You would start the process by going to Invoices, Receive Payment. Choose the account UNDEPOSITED FUNDS(all in caps) under receive to account. Enter the effective date,  currency and the customer. Under Receipt Batch, click on new to create a new batch or use an existing one you created.

Choose the invoices to pay and then record the payment. Move on to the next customer to collect and keep posting payment until you are done.

Once all the payments are recorded, go to Invoices, list batches and find the batch you are using and click on the pencil icon to go into it.  You should see the options to download ACH file and send ACH via SFTP. If you prefer to send the file  yourself to your bank, you can just download the file and send it.  There is also an option to email your customers a notice that you are withdrawing from their account.

Once you send the file to the bank, it will take the bank a few days to process and collect the payments. Any issues with the payment will be forwarded by the bank.  Once you confirm all the amounts are in your bank account, you can go back to the batch and choose the option to deposit the batch into your bank account.