Unfortunately, sometimes attempted payments fail for reasons outside your control. This can happen to both ACH and Credit Card payments. Learn how to spot failed payments and what to do with them below.
How to Spot Failed Payments
ACH Payments
An ACH return happens when someone tries to pay using their bank account, but the bank says no.
When an ACH payment (an eCheck) is posted, it gets put in a "Pending" status until the Customer's bank funds the payment. Their bank can make one of two decisions:
"Settle" the payment. This usually takes between 3 to 5 business days
"Reject" the payment.
Here's how Enrollsy handles rejected ACH payments:
Admin Email Notifications
Admin users who have the setting "Receive failed customer payment emails" turned on will receive the following email notifications:
“Autopay Summary” email, which shows all auto-pay rejected payments. These are credit card and ACH payments that get rejected at auto-pay (and are not in Enrollsy).
“Failed ACH Payments Notification” email, which shows any rejected/failed ACH payments (the ones that show up in Enrollsy).
If you have access to manage admin users, you can change this setting by going to My Company > Users > Admins or clicking here to manage your admins' users.
ACHQ (for those with EnrollsyPay) also sends an email to the Speedchex (payment gateway) owner when an ACH payment is rejected.
Customer Email Notifications
Customers whose ACH payments fail (and they show in Enrollsy that they failed) do receive an email notification. Customers can log in to their account, update their payment credentials, and try the payment again.
NOTE: Customers will NOT receive an email for any credit card or ACH payments that fail at auto-pay (and do not show up in Enrollsy).
A/R Aging Report
From the A/R Aging Report (MENU > Reports > A/R AGING), you will see an icon next to the account holder's name if a rejected ACH payment within the last 90 days.
Account Billing Tab
Within an Account's BILLING tab, you will see a warning box (see screenshot below) explaining a recently rejected payment on the account. When a rejected ACH payment occurs, their Auto-Pay setting is automatically turned off to protect your merchant account from repeated bounced check fees.
Transaction History
Under the Transaction History (on the Billing tab), you will see the transaction and any insufficient fund fees you charge:
NOTE: The charge(s) will go back to the original invoice and the invoice will be current again. Any non-sufficient fund (NSF) fees will go on a separate invoice.
Credit Card Payments
Email Notifications
When the card declines, the Admin users who have the setting "Receive failed customer payment emails" turned on will receive an email notification of all declined credit card and ACH payments during Auto-pay.
If you have access to manage Admin Users, you can change this setting by going to My Company > Users > Admins or clicking here to edit Admin email notifications.
We will be working on a notification of declined credit card payments that will show up in the Notification Center, as well as emails that will go out to both Customers and Admin users.
How to Remedy Failed Payments
For both ACH and Credit Card Failed Payments, will need to instruct the Customer to log in to their account, update their payment credentials, and try the payment again. If the Customer doesn't update their information, Admins can contact the Customer and replace the card on file over the phone or in another way.
NSF Fees
You can set up an "NSF Fee" so that Enrollsy will automatically charge it to the Customer's account balance in the event of a rejected ACH payment. Click here to go to your "ITEMS" page to edit the price of your "NSF Fee."
The purpose of this automatic fee is to help cover any costs your bank imposes on you when a bounced check (in this case, an electronic check) happens. You can check with CardConnect to see your ACH payment NSF fee.
Using EnrollsyPay, you will be charged a $5.00 fee for each NSF transaction. Keep this and all other factors in mind as you determine the right amount to charge your Customers for NSF transactions. You can, of course, edit/delete the fees you pass through to your Customers on a case-by-case basis, but you will always be charged.