The current pre-defined Payment Methods have been replaced by new user-definable Payment Profiles to give greater flexibility in defining how suppliers are paid and in particular enabling payments to be made from multiple bank accounts within the same company.
With this greater flexibility, the process of creating a bank payment file has been enhanced to be able to select which bank the payments are to be processed and in some cases which potentially separate payment format to use.
To achieve this the workflow for the Payments Process has been redesigned to allow for multiple suggested payment runs to be managed and through the use of Workflow Groups greater control is available to define what each user is able to do within the payments process.
Switching over to the new version should be seamless for existing users, as Aqilla will automatically create workflow group permissions for existing Pro Users capable of processing payments.
The new features allow a great deal more fine-tuning of controls, including being able to set pay value permissions at an individual account level as opposed to the overall payment value being authorised.
In particular, users should note certain key changes within this release:
Enquiries: Transaction Status has been renamed to Payment Status
In Configuration: the Payment Export Format is moved from the Company Definition to the new separate Payment Profiles section
Transaction Statuses: the “Entered” transition state is being renamed “Standard”
On Creditor accounts: “Bank Branch” has been relabelled to “Bank Branch/Country”
Payment Process Enhancements
Payment Profiles replace the existing predefined Payment Methods in Aqilla. A Payment Profile is used to specify how a payment is to be made, e.g. manual, cheque, bank transfer, etc. If it is a bank transfer the export format can be selected from the list of supported formats:
Payment Profiles
A second export format can also be specified if it is for the same bank, such as using BACS or Faster Payments. When the user selects a payment file to download, they are given the option of which format to use.
On the initial upgrade, there will be Payment Profiles that correspond to the current Payment Methods. New Profiles may be created and unused profiles deleted.
The Payment Method specified in Creditors and Debtors now refers to the Payment Profile of the same name.
Important – if using an export format with current BACS or Single BACS Payment Methods, users are advised to check that the correct format has been assigned to their new Payment Profiles.
Payments Files
Greater flexibility has been added to the creation of payment files for submission to an Aqilla user’s bank. Using multiple Payment Profiles, it is now possible to generate payments to multiple banks.
When downloading a payment file, if multiple Payment Profiles exist for export formats, the user is asked to select which profile to use and if that profile supports multiple export formats, which format to use for this payment file.
Payments Workflow
The current payments process supports a simple workflow allowing transactions to be transitioned between “Entered” (which in the new release is now renamed as “Standard”), “Withheld”, or “Forced”.
With the new release, the workflow has been enhanced to support 5 additional states to allow multiple proposed payment runs to be managed.
The workflow is now managed through Workflow Groups, allowing finer control of who may do what.
A new Workflow Group (Payments and Debits) has been created for this purpose and populated to give all existing Pro users the equivalent Payments permissions as before the upgrade. These permissions may be tailored to refine an individual’s permissions and utilise the additional payment states as required.
Pay (Pay or Pay & Remit) is only available within the Payments Process.
The remaining transitions must be done in Payment Status (formally Transaction Status)
HSBC Priority Payments
The HSBC_ pain.001.001.03 international “Priority Payments” format is now supported by Aqilla.
This format requires additional information that is not needed in other bank payment formats. In particular, the address information of the payee needs to be specified in a more rigid format. To help maintain this information, the labels of address lines 3 and 4 have been renamed “Town” and “Region/State/County”
Additionally, the “Bank Branch” in the Creditor account is relabelled “Bank Branch/Country”.
Improved controls on access to Accounts Payable and Receivable accounts
Users with access to Aged Reports, Statement of Accounts, or the new Payment Status enquiry are generally able to select either Debtor or Creditor accounts. With this latest release, It is now possible to limit individual users to one type of account in these functions.
The default setting in Instance Settings is Access Granted to these account types, and if you wish to deny individual users access to one of the account types, add the Role “No Access to Creditor Accounts” or “No Access to Debtor Accounts”.
Alternatively, if the Instance Setting is changed to Access Denied, then individual users may be given access by adding the Roles “Access to Creditor Accounts” or “Access to Debtor Accounts”.
Plaid Renewal of Bank Connection Credentials
The connection credentials between Plaid and your bank account need to be renewed from time to time, typically every 90 days. If the details are not renewed before they expire, statement transactions may be lost, and a new connection must be created in its place.
Aqilla now monitors the expiry date and can send a warning if the expiry is within 14 days. To receive the notification, you must set up a Notification Template as described in Aqilla Help.
