Pledge Payment Schedules

The following information is included in this topic:

• Concepts
• Pledge Information Form
• Payment Schedule Form
• Editing a Payment Schedule
• Payments Table Column Descriptions
• Payments Table Indices

Concepts

The Payments table is a secondary table that may be attached to a primary Gift or Dues Transaction row which has a Transaction Type of pledge, expectancy, or match pledge. The Payment row contains the information necessary to create and track an anticipated schedule of payments for the pledge transaction. This schedule is useful in creating pledge bills or due notices to be sent to the constituent, if your institution chooses to do so. They may also be used to produce reports showing the timing and amounts of expected donations.

When a donation is received from the constituent that is to be applied to a Pledge Transaction, it must be entered into the database via the context menu for the original Pledge Transaction. When you pass the mouse pointer over the edit button for that transaction and then the Special item in the resulting menu, a cascading menu will include the item, Post Pledge Payment. When that is done, the amount of the Pledge Payment Transaction will automatically be registered with the Payment Schedule, reducing the amount due of the next scheduled payment (whether its due date has arrived yet or not). If the donation is more than the expected amount, the excess is applied to the following payment in the schedule and the amounts will be adjusted appropriately.

The data from the linked Payment table is not displayed within the giving transaction's display. Its display is accessed via a calendar icon which appears in the lower left corner of the individual Gift or Dues transaction's display. This icon appears in both the Short and Long display of the giving transaction. To view the schedule of Payments that are linked to the transaction, you may click on the icon. When you do so, the giving display will be replaced with the schedule of Payments, in the display frame.

When a Gift or Dues Transaction is created with a Type of Pledge or Expectancy, the system will automatically prompt for the information necessary to create the Payment Schedule.

When a Gift or Dues Transaction is created with a Type of Expectancy, the system will create a payment schedule with a single row, no due date, and Billable set to 'N'.

When a Gift or Dues Transaction is created with a Type of Match Pledge, and if your site has checked the 'Display Matching Payment Schedule' system option, then the system will automatically prompt for the information necessary to create the Payment Schedule. If this option is unchecked, then the system will create a payment schedule with a single row, no due date, and Billable set to 'N'.

Pledge Information Form

After inserting a pledge transaction, enter information about the pledge on the Pledge Information form. The system will use this information to create a payment schedule for the pledge.

Pledge Type

This refers to the time interval between the expected payments. These items are taken from the Pledge Types Lookup table. If this text box is left blank or if the items Special or Special No Bill are chosen, the system will automatically create a payment schedule which is made up of a single payment. (This is the case even if you also enter a number of payments in the text box that follows this one.) If you want to create an irregular schedule of payments, you should use any of those three entries and then edit the payment schedule to reflect the donor's desired schedule and number of payments.

The system will recognize the other standard entries as shown below and create a schedule of payments using the interval you choose, the Number of payments, and the Start Date. It will calculate the amount of each payment accordingly. Once they have been created, the details of any of the individual payments may be edited.

Value	Code	Notes
Annual	a
Annual No Bill	an
Bi-Monthly	b
Bi-Monthly No Bill	bn
Bi-Weekly	bw
Bi-Weekly No Bill	bwn
Monthly	m
Monthly No Bill	mn
Quarterly	q
Quarterly No Bill	qn
Semi-Annual	s
Semi-Annual No Bill	sn
Semi-Monthly	sm
Semi-Monthly No Bill	smn
Special Special No Bill	z zn	The Special and Special No Bill billing cycles should be used when the schedule of payments will not conform to any of those shown above. The system will automatically create a single payment in the schedule and you should edit that schedule to reflect the desired cycle of payments.

As shown, each of the cycles may also be chosen with the "No Bill" option. If you choose one of those cycles, the payments are flagged so that you can easily suppress the creation of Pledge Bills for that set of payments. Once the set of payments has been created, the bill/no bill option may be edited on a payment by payment basis, if desired.

Payment Count

This refers to the number of payments that are expected from the constituent. If the Billing Cycle is left blank or if either of the Special cycles is chosen, this information will be ignored by the system. If any of the other standard billing cycles are used, then the system will use the # of payments and the cycle to determine the amount that will be due with each payment. (Note that this is the case, even if a Start Date is not provided.)

Start Date

This is the date on which the first payment is expected. This date must be entered as a four digit year, a month (leading zeroes are optional) and a day (day is optional as are leading zeroes). The system will calculate all subsequent dates for scheduled payments based on this date and the Billing Cycle that is chosen. If the day is not entered, then the start day defaults to the first day of the month. If the Billing Cycle is left blank or if either of the Special cycles is chosen, when a Start Date is provided, the system will create a single payment in the schedule, with a due date matching the Start Date you provided.

Conditional

This indicates whether the original Pledge Transaction is to be considered Conditional or Unconditional. See Conditional/Unconditional, in the Gift Transactions topic, for further information. The setting from this check box will be applied to the original Pledge Transaction.

Using the information you provide for these columns, the system will automatically create a Payments row for each scheduled payment for this pledge transaction.

When the Giving or Dues row is shown in either Long, Short, or Detail display, a small calendar icon will appear in the lower left corner of the display area for that Transaction. To view or edit the Payments schedule, you may click on that icon. The display frame will switch to a Payment Schedule form.

Payment Schedule Form

The Payment Schedule form is used to edit an existing system-generated pledge payment schedule.

At the time that a Pledge transaction is entered, the system automatically creates a schedule that specifies the due date and due amount for each Payment that you expect the donor will be making. But, this automatic schedule may not reflect the schedule or the variable payment amounts that the donor wants, so it may be necessary to change it. Use the Payment Schedule form to make changes to these system-generated due dates and due amounts. You can also change Payment billing policies (for example, convert a billable payment to a non-billable payment), add a Payment to a schedule, or remove a Payment from a payment schedule by using this form.

There are two sections to the Payment Schedule form:

• The details section contains information about the scheduled Payments, Each scheduled Payment is represented by one row in the details section.

• The header section contains information about the original Pledge Transaction and any Pledge Payment Transactions that have already been applied to it. More:

  This information is a reflection of the data that is contained in the original Pledge Transaction and any Allocations, and also any Pledge Payment Transactions that have been applied to it. When payments are made for multiple allocations, the payments are linked to each Allocation via the Pledge Key (giftplgkey) and not the Allocation Key (giftallkey).

The header section contains the following fields:

Amount

The Pledge Amount shows the full amount of the original Pledge transaction. This amount is taken from the data in the Pledge transaction row and will remain constant throughout the lifetime of the Pledge unless a Write-Off transaction has been applied to the original Pledge transaction. Once a Pledge transaction has been written-off and no longer has an outstanding balance, no additional payments can be made.

The Paid Amount shows the full amount of all of the Pledge Payments that have been posted against the original Pledge transaction. This amount will change as additional Pledge Payment transactions are entered through data maintenance.

Both the Pledge and the Paid amounts will remain constant as you make adjustments to the payment schedule.

Difference

The Pledge Difference will change when you adjust the Due amount for any Payment already on the schedule or when you add a payment to, or remove a Payment from, the schedule.

The Paid Difference will change when you adjust the Paid amount for any Payment already on the schedule, or when you add a Payment to, or remove a Payment from, the schedule.

When the Payment Schedule form is first displayed, the Pledge Difference and the Paid Difference are zero. As you make adjustments to the payment schedule, the difference amounts will change to give you a reminder of the funds that still need to be distributed. Before you can finish, both the Pledge and Paid differences must equal zero again. When the differences equal zero, then all funds have been accounted for.

The details section contains the following fields for each scheduled payment:

Due Date

The date on which the Payment is scheduled to be paid, and the time after which your site should expect to receive the scheduled amount.

Due

The expected amount of the Payment. When the payment schedule is first created, these due amounts are evenly distributed among the number of Payments that you indicated when you entered the Pledge transaction. This distribution can be adjusted in any way that the donor prefers, but the sum of all due amounts must still be equal the Pledge Amount that is shown in the header.

Paid

This field shows the portion of the total Paid Amount that is distributed to each scheduled Payment. By default, the system applies the amount of a Pledge Payment transaction to the first scheduled Payment until that amount is met. If there are additional funds remaining, they will be applied to the second scheduled Payment, and continue in this manner until the Pledge has been fulfilled. If your site or the donor prefer, you may edit this distribution as you want. For example, if a constituent overpays a particular scheduled payment, he or she may prefer to apply excess funds to the final Payment rather than the next scheduled one. After adjusting this distribution, the sum of all paid amounts must equal the Paid Amount that is shown in the header.

Billable?

This flag field indicates whether a pledge bill should or should not be generated for the Payment. The check box is not selected and no bill for the payment will be sent (The Billable? flag is 'off') if you selected one of the No Bill Pledge Types when you created the Pledge. This is the default behavior for every Payment, but you can reset the Billable? flag on any individual payment by using the Payment Schedule form.

Edit a the Payment Schedule

1. Access the Giving Detail display for the constituent who owns the original Pledge and then locate the specific Pledge Transaction.
2. Click the Payment Schedule button (located directly under the common information for the pledge, and above the information for the first allocation).
3. You can use the Transactions menu if that is your preference. Point to the Edit button to the left of the Pledge Transaction. Point to Transactions. Click Payment Schedule. The Payment Schedule form displays.
4. Edit each payment as you want.
   1. Due and Paid amounts can be edited by typing a new or different amount. The Paid amount can never be more than the Due amount (for any individual payment in the schedule).
   2. Due dates can be adjusted by directly typing the date (in correct date format), or by using the calendar icon to locate the desired date.
   3. The billing policy for the payment can be changed by toggling the Billable? check box.
5. Click Delete to remove a Payment from the schedule. You will not be able to confirm your intention to delete a Payment before it is removed from the Payment Schedule form, but changes to the payment schedule itself (in the database) will not be permanent until you click Finish.
6. Additional Payments can be added to the schedule by clicking Add Payment. Enter the payment details (Due Date, Due, Paid, Billable?). The Due amount for new payments must be greater than zero. Notice that the labels for the payments that you have added to the schedule will be in bold to indicate that they are new.
7. Click Sort at any time to sort the payments in Due Date order (from first Due to last). This is especially useful as you add and remove payments from the Payment Schedule form.
8. Once the payment schedule appears as you want, click Finish. Remember that both the Pledge Difference and the Paid Difference amounts must be zero before the system will allow you to finish your payment schedule changes.
9. At any time, you can click Cancel to close the Payment Schedule form without registering any changes.

Payments Field Descriptions

Pledge Payment schedule data is stored in the payments data table. The chart below describes the columns that are included in the actions data table. The column labels and non-displaying designations that are listed in the chart are those that the system uses by default. If you wish to override these default settings, you must customize your display definition.

Note: Custom fields are included in the data table, and are available for any purpose that you want to define. These fields are not shown on the standard Display or standard Data Maintenance forms. If you want to make use of one or more of the custom fields, use the Custom Display Designer to edit the standard Display and Data Maintenance forms.

Field Name Field Label	Lookup Table	Type SQL/Oracle Length [Default] {Check}	Description
paykey non-displaying	none	numeric/number 13,0	The primary key field for all rows in all tables. This field holds a permanent "time stamp" of the precise time and date the row was created. This uniquely identifies a row within the table. (system field)
payid non-displaying	none	char 10	This field holds the ID number of the constituent who owns this row, providing a link between this row and all others in all other tables which also belong to the same constituent. (system field)
paydoc non-displaying	none	char 1 ['N']	This field holds a Y/N flag to indicate the existence of a linked document for this row. (system field)
paydate no label	none	datetime/date   [getdate()]	The date that this Payments row was last updated. This field is automatically entered by the system. (system field)
payuserid no label	none	varchar/varchar2 30 [suser_sname()]	The User ID of the operator that last edited this Payments row. It is automatically entered by the system. (system field)
payusergrp non-displaying	none	char 1 ['Z']	This field holds the Group letter that was associated with the User ID of the operator who last edited this row. (system field)
paydueamt Amount Due	none	money/number   [0]	The original, scheduled amount of the payment, represented in this row. This amount remains constant unless the Payment Schedule is edited.
payduedate Date Due	none	datetime/date	The date on which this payment is due to be received.
paybalamt Balance Amount	none	money/number   [0]	The amount of this Payment that remains to be paid by the constituent. This will automatically be reduced based on Pledge Payment Transactions that are posted against the original Pledge Transaction to which this Payment schedule is linked.
paybilling Billable	none	char 1 ['N'] {'N' or 'Y'}	This field acts as a flag to easily identify those Payments that should or should not be billed.
paylinkfil non-displaying	none	char 2 ['05'] {'08' or '05'}	This field holds the file (table) number of either the Transaction or Dues table, indicating to which kind of row this Payment row is attached. (system field)
paylinkkey non-displaying	none	numeric/number 13,0 [0]	This field holds a copy of the key field from the primary Transaction or Dues row to which this Payment row is attached. (system field)
paysource Source	Source	char 6 [' ']	The source for the information in this row.
paypoint non-displaying	none	numeric/number 10,0	This system-assigned field is no longer used or supported. (system field)
paycrdate non-displaying	none	datetime/date   [getdate()]	The date that the row was created. (system field)
payfnum non-displaying	none	char 2 ['38'] {'38'}	The file (table) number for the Payments table. (system field)
paycomm no label	none	varchar/varchar2 4000	A free text Comment that may be entered and displayed with this row only.
paydate1	none	datetime/date	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any date information associated with this data row.
paydate2	none	datetime/date	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any date information associated with this data row.
paymny1	none	money/number	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any monetary information associated with this data row.
paymny2	none	money/number	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any monetary information associated with this data row.
paynum1	none	numeric/number 10, 0	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any numeric information associated with this data row.
paynum2	none	numeric/number 10, 0	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any numeric information associated with this data row.
payyesno	none	char 1 ['N'] {'N' or 'Y'}	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to flag this data row for any purpose.
paylook1	Payments Lookup1	char 6	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any lookup table driven information associated with this data row.
paylook2	Payments Lookup2	char 6	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any lookup table driven information associated with this data row.
paylook3	Payments Lookup3	char 6	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any lookup table driven information associated with this data row.
paytext	none	varchar/varchar2 255	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any free text information you want to associate with this data row.
payjrnlfl non-displaying	none	char 1 ['N'] {'Y' or 'N'}	This system-generated field is a flag indicating whether the transaction to which this data row is linked has ('Y') or has not ('N') been journaled. (system field)
payjrnldt non-displaying	none	datetime/date	This system-generated field is used to hold the date on which the transaction to which this data row is linked was journaled (if ever). (system field)
paydate3	none	datetime/date	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any date information associated with this data row.
paydate4	none	datetime/date	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any date information associated with this data row.
paydate5	none	datetime/date	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any date information associated with this data row.
paydate6	none	datetime/date	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any date information associated with this data row.
paydate7	none	datetime/date	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any date information associated with this data row.
paydate8	none	datetime/date	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any date information associated with this data row.
paydate9	none	datetime/date	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any date information associated with this data row.
paydte10	none	datetime/date	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any date information associated with this data row.
paydte11	none	datetime/date	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any date information associated with this data row.
paydte12	none	datetime/date	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any date information associated with this data row.
paymny3	none	money/number (19,4)/(16,2)	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any monetary information associated with this data row.
paymny4	none	money/number (19,4)/(16,2)	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any monetary information associated with this data row.
paymny5	none	money/number (19,4)/(16,2)	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any monetary information associated with this data row.
paymny6	none	money/number (19,4)/(16,2)	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any monetary information associated with this data row.
paymny7	none	money/number (19,4)/(16,2)	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any monetary information associated with this data row.
paymny8	none	money/number (19,4)/(16,2)	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any monetary information associated with this data row.
paymny9	none	money/number (19,4)/(16,2)	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any monetary information associated with this data row.
paymny10	none	money/number (19,4)/(16,2)	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any monetary information associated with this data row.
paymny11	none	money/number (19,4)/(16,2)	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any monetary information associated with this data row.
paymny12	none	money/number (19,4)/(16,2)	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any monetary information associated with this data row.
paynum3	none	numeric/number 10, 0	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any numeric information associated with this data row.
paynum4	none	numeric/number 10, 0	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any numeric information associated with this data row.
paynum5	none	numeric/number 10, 0	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any numeric information associated with this data row.
paynum6	none	numeric/number 10, 0	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any numeric information associated with this data row.
paynum7	none	numeric/number 10, 0	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any numeric information associated with this data row.
paynum8	none	numeric/number 10, 0	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any numeric information associated with this data row.
paynum9	none	numeric/number 10, 0	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any numeric information associated with this data row.
paynum10	none	numeric/number 10, 0	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any numeric information associated with this data row.
paynum11	none	numeric/number 10, 0	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any numeric information associated with this data row.
paynum12	none	numeric/number 10, 0	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any numeric information associated with this data row.
paychk1	none	char 1 ['N'] {'N' or 'Y'}	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to flag this data row for any purpose.
paychk2	none	char 1 ['N'] {'N' or 'Y'}	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to flag this data row for any purpose.
paychk3	none	char 1 ['N'] {'N' or 'Y'}	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to flag this data row for any purpose.
paychk4	none	char 1 ['N'] {'N' or 'Y'}	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to flag this data row for any purpose.
paychk5	none	char 1 ['N'] {'N' or 'Y'}	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to flag this data row for any purpose.
paychk6	none	char 1 ['N'] {'N' or 'Y'}	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to flag this data row for any purpose.
paychk7	none	char 1 ['N'] {'N' or 'Y'}	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to flag this data row for any purpose.
paychk8	none	char 1 ['N'] {'N' or 'Y'}	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to flag this data row for any purpose.
paychk9	none	char 1 ['N'] {'N' or 'Y'}	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to flag this data row for any purpose.
paychk10	none	char 1 ['N'] {'N' or 'Y'}	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to flag this data row for any purpose.
paytxt1	none	varchar/varchar2 255	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any free text information you want to associate with this data row.
paytxt2	none	varchar/varchar2 255	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any free text information you want to associate with this data row.
paytxt3	none	varchar/varchar2 255	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any free text information you want to associate with this data row.
paytxt4	none	varchar/varchar2 255	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any free text information you want to associate with this data row.
paytxt5	none	varchar/varchar2 255	This custom column may be defined and used by your institution to track any free text information you want to associate with this data row.

Indices - Payments

Index	Primary	Foreign	Unique	Fields	Sort
pk_payments	Y		Y	paykey	ASC
payments01		Y		payid	ASC
payments02		Y		paylinkfil paylinkkey	ASC

Top of Page