If payment details are entered incorrectly, the bank may reject payments generated through SME Professional.
1. Recognising a bounced payment
A bounced payment will often appear to have cleared successfully at first and there will be a debiting (money out) transaction showing the payment being made from the client account.
A day or two later, you may receive a crediting transaction with 'RETURN' or 'REJECTED' in the reference line. This will show the payment bouncing back into the client account.
2. Checking payment details
First, users should double-check the payment details stored in the property record and ensure that the account number and sort code are correct. To access the property record, navigate to Properties > View properties and click on the property address. The bank details are held in the Finance tab.
Note: If the landlord uses a building society, users need to input a building society roll number against the property for the payment to be successful.
3. Assigning a bounced payment
Users should assign both transactions described in Section 1 (the credit and debit) to the suspense account. This will record the bounced payment, but the two transactions cancelling to £0 will not appear on the landlord statements.
If the bulk payment system is being used, this will also allow the manual payment line to be retained so that when the payment to the landlord is successful, the manual transaction and new client transaction can be matched.
To assign the credit
Navigate to Bank > View bank lines
Locate the bank transaction that shows the money being returned (this will be a crediting bank transaction with the account type client)
Click on the edit pencil icon
Change the Category to Business and the Subcategory to Suspense account
To assign the debit
Locate the bank transaction that shows the failed payment out of the account (this will be a debiting bank line with the account type client)
Click on the edit pencil icon
If the Matched bank ID field is populated, highlight and delete this number
Click on Submit
Click on the edit pencil icon again
Change the Category to Business and the Subcategory to Suspense account
Note: Steps 2-4 only apply if the line is already matched.
Once the above has been completed, users can manually process a transfer out of the bank to pay the landlord. Please ensure that this is for the exact amount that was transferred previously.
When this transaction appears in unassigned lines this can be matched as usual.