Add a Payment Term

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Overview

A payment term is a non-electronic form of payment, typically a check. You must be a user with the Finance role enabled in the Security section under Configuration to be able to access this function. Note that payment terms differ from payment methods, which are used for electronic payments, such as credit cards and ACH.

This feature allows clients to configure a discount for their customers who pay the total balance on their bill early. Clients can define an early payment period and the discount on the bill when payment is received within that period. The discount appears on the bill as a "prompt payment discount" and is implemented as a cash credit transaction.

Getting Here: Click Finance > Payment Terms > New

Values for this screen are as follows:

Name: Client-defined name for this payment term.
Client Defined Identifier: Unique identifier for the payment term.
Description: Description of the payment term to be presented on customer-facing documents.
EAN or GLN: This field indicates if this payment term is used with European Article Numbers or Global Location Numbers (EAN/GLN). These numbers are required when sending invoices in certain European countries, and are a widely used format throughout Europe. If this box is checked for this payment term, then fields for these values display when you apply this payment term to an account or master plan instance. If the fields are displayed, they are required.
Account Group: Select one of the following from the drop-down menu.
- All Accounts Payment term applies to all accounts.
- A group of accounts: Payment term applies to accounts in a specific payment group. If you select this option, a a text field displays that allows you to specify a functional account group.
- No accounts: Payment term is not applied to any accounts.
Days Until Due: Number of days from the invoice date when the payment is due. Allowable values are 0 to 999.

This field has options that allow the user to choose whether the Days Until Due is based on the Invoice Date plus nn days or based on the end of the current month plus nn days. For electronic payment methods, this determines which day the electronic collection is attempted. Options include:

Apply After the Invoice Date: days are calculated based on the invoice date (default)
Apply at the End of the Month: days are calculated based on the end of the current month.

Bill Lag Days: Enter the number of days prior to (negative) or after (positive) an account billing date at which an invoice is generated. The Bill Lag Days setting in the Collection Group screen overrides the Bill Lag Days setting in the Payment Terms screen, and the Bill Lag Days setting in the Payment Terms screen overrides the Bill Lag Days setting in the Billing Recurring Interval screen. When the Allow Negative Bill Lag Days to Extend Beyond One Bill Cycle setting is True, the range of days displayed next to this field displays as Must be less than/equal to 27 days.

Bill Lag Days can also be set at the collection group level. See Create a Collection Group for additional information. The Bill Lag Days setting in the Collection Group screen overrides the Bill Lag Days setting in the Payment Terms and Payment Method screens, and the Bill Lag Days setting in the Payment Method or Payment Terms screens overrides the Bill Lag Days setting in the Billing Recurring Interval screen (Configuration > Billing > Bill Lag Days).

Discount: The percentage discount a customer receives for prompt payment. Allowable values are 1 to 100.
Discount Period (Days): Number of days after the invoice date when the customer is eligible to receive a discount. If you enter a value in the Discount field, then you must enter a value in this field. This value cannot be greater than the value in the Days Until Due field.
Surcharge: This field allows you to associate a surcharge with the payment term. Select a surcharge from the drop-down menu to be associated with this payment term.

Auto Bill Orders: Check this box to bill orders immediately upon generation. This can be overridden by the order creation process.
Send Payment Reminder Notifications: Check this box to send reminders to a statement, administrative, or billing contact as the due date approaches.

To set up payment reminders, use the following steps:

Click the checkbox to select Send Payment Reminder Notification. If there are email templates assigned to Payment Reminders 01, 02, and 03, a list of Payment Reminder options displays.
Optionally, you can select Send Reminder for Active Accounts Only, to limit payment reminders to Active accounts.
For each payment reminder, enter the following information:

Days Until Payment Reminder: The number of days the system waits to send a payment reminder notification when an invoice goes unpaid. Payment reminder emails can be configured in the Email Templates section of the application, and can be overridden at the Payment Terms, Functional Account Group, and individual account levels.

Note: The following two fields do not display until after you enter a value in the Days Until Payment Reminder field.

Default Payment Reminder Template: Select the payment reminder email template as the default for this payment term. This template can be overridden on the Notification Template Group associated with a Functional Account Group, or at the individual account level under 'Notification Method' in the Account Overview. The payment reminders specified here share the same email templates used for payment reminders at the account level.
Notification Recipients: Select the account contact to receive the payment reminder email.
- Default: Account's default contact option
- Administrative: Account's administrative contact
- Billing: Billing contact
- All: Sends the notification to all contacts

Click Save when you are done.

After you have saved a payment term, you cannot update the Days Until Due, Discount, or Discount Period.