Setting up automatic ACH recurring payments is an excellent way for both borrowers and institutions to ensure payments are made on a timely basis. But what if your customers get paid twice a month and would rather split their monthly payments into two separate payments based on when they get their paycheck?

Before CIM GOLD version 7.9.3 was released, more frequent automatic payments weren’t really possible. Some institutions may have set up multiple future payments to achieve this, but that required someone remembering to set up the next series of future payments. CIM GOLD version 7.9.3 makes it possible for institutions to set up automatic recurring payments on a weekly, bi-weekly, or semi-monthly basis, if the loan frequency is usually monthly.

Here’s how it works:

To allow for differing recurring ACH payments, your GOLDPoint Systems account manager will need to set up the following options on the EZPay IMAC Table:

• Show Weekly ACH Recurring (EZRAWK)
• Show Bi-Weekly ACH Recurring (EZRABW)
• Show Semi-month ACH Recur (EZRASM)
• Show Monthly ACH Recurring (EZRAMO)

When these options are set, the Recurring ACH Payment field group on the EZPay screen changes slightly, as shown below.

You can see in the screen example above that all four recurring payment options are available. Your institution can use whichever options you need. You can set up all these options, but whether or not they all show on the EZPay screen is determined by the loan frequency.

These options cannot be used to set up a payment schedule that is less frequent than the established loan frequency. For example, a loan with a frequency of weekly will not show the Weekly, Bi-Weekly, Semi-Monthly, and Monthly options.

Institution option FPRA must be set in order to use recurring payments.

Real-life Example

Now that the options are set, you can set up differing recurring payments on the EZPay screen. Let’s say for this example a borrower wants to set up recurring payments made on the 7th and 22nd of each month, because that is when he is paid. His regular loan payment is $100. Here’s how you would set up those payments using the EZPay screen in CIM GOLD:

• Select the E-Check radio button.
• Select the Recurring radio button.
• Select the Semi-monthly radio button.
• Choose the next Start Date when the system will pull the ACH payment. This date must be in the future. Since the borrower would like payments pulled on the 7th and 22nd, we would set the Start Date as “01/07/2019,” and the system will automatically calculate 15 days after that as the second date, which is 01/22/2019.
• Make sure a Name has been selected in the Account Information field group, as well as a Payment Account.
• The system does not automatically calculate the new payment amount. Instead, the Other radio button is selected in the Payment Amount field group. Enter the payment amount that will be pulled for each frequency. In this example, we would divide 100 by 2, and we would enter "50.00" in the Other field.
• Click <Submit Payment>. Now the system will pull the ACH payment of $50.00 starting on the 7th and 22nd of this month.

See the following example highlighting these steps.