Get Started with Payment Assistant

Payment Assistant handles all of your vendor payments. With secure virtual card payments, faster ACH processing, and remote check printing vendors are paid quickly and on time, giving you more time to focus on your mission.

Note: Payment Assistant™ is currently in Limited Availability (LA). Are you interested in participating? Apply to join our LA group. During this time, we'll review and implement participant feedback to prepare for general availability.

In this tutorial, you'll learn how to set up and use Payment Assistant, including how to create and approve payment runs.

You'll also navigate the entire feature area and learn how to:

  • Sign up for Payment Assistant

  • Approve payment runs

  • Post payments

  • Mark paid payments as cleared in the registrar

Your ability to perform each of these items depends on your user permissions. We recommend you spend as much time as you need on roles and permissions so that you understand and have the appropriate user rights set up.

Set up roles and assign permissions

For Payment Assistant, you will create roles based on a user's ability to manage:

  • Create links to bank accounts

  • View, manage, and approve payment runs

  • Configure Payment Assistant, including approval notifications, vendor EFT data sharing, and setup

Tip: By default, solution admins have permission to set up Payment Assistant. If you want someone else to have permission, solution admins can create a Payment Assistant role and assign it the Payment Assistant setup permission.

Once your roles are set up how you need them, you then assign the roles to users.

Set up Payment Assistant roles

Control panel > Security > Security roles

Before you set up the new roles, it may help you to review the available tasks and determine how many roles you want and who can view versus who can perform tasks in Payment Assistant. Among the important things to consider, is who can approve payment runs. All payment runs have to be approved before a vendor can be paid.

Create Payment Assistant role screen.

These are the currently available tasks you can assign to a role.

  1. Navigate to Control panel, Security, and select Security roles.

  2. Under Payment Assistant roles, select New.

  3. Enter a name for the role and a description. Then, select the tasks you want the role to perform. Each user can only be assigned one role for Payment Assistant, so be sure to select all the tasks you need them to do in that role.

  4. Select Save.

  5. Repeat for the additional roles you need set up.

Assign Payment Assistant roles to users

Control panel > Security > User management

Once the roles are set up, you are ready to assign them to users.

  1. Navigate to Control panel, Security, and select User management.

  2. Search for the user and select the context menu next to the user's name.

  3. Select Manage roles.

  4. If the user is going to need all tasks for Payment Assistant, select Make solution admin. You don't need to select any other Payment roles for the user as they will automatically have full access to all the roles.

    For users who will perform specific tasks in Payment Assistant, find Payment Assistant and select a role for the user.

    Select a Payment Assistant role to assign to the user.

    When you assign the user a role, the role description appears and the Payment Assistant security role automatically selects.

  5. Select Save.

You are now ready to set up Payment Assistant.

Sign up for Payment Assistant

Payables > Payment Assistant

The first time you navigate to Payables, Payment Assistant, you will see the Getting Started page.

To start the application process, select Start the Payment Service agreement. The agreement screen appears with steps that walk you through the entire sign-up process, including choosing the bank account you want to use. To be able to pay vendors, determine which bank account you want to use to withdraw money from to pay vendors. Currently, you can only select one bank account.

When you initiate a payment directly to a vendor within Financial Edge NXT, you no longer have to print checks or download/upload EFT files. Payment Assistant handles the payments directly to the vendors for you.

To help you complete the application, here is some key info you should have ready:

  • Organization details

  • Executive sponsor info

  • Bank account info

  • Authorized signer info

Once you complete the agreement information, you can download and review the contract. Then, when you submit the agreement, your authorized signer receives an email to sign the contract with Docusign.

To opt-in to sharing your EFT vendor bank account details with Payment Assistant so that vendors can be set up to be paid by ACH if they choose to do so, select Allow EFT sharing. For more information, see Payment Assistant™ Settings.

Before you move on to using Payment Assistant, verify that you have set up a role to approve payment runs and assigned that to at least one user in your organization.

Know Your Client (KYC) is a standard in the financial industry that ensures that we can verify your identity when opening an account, or in this case, setting up an account with Payment Assistant. This is an important step to assess risk and is a legal requirement to comply with Anti-Money Laundering (AML) laws.

The waiting period for Payment Assistant can be up to 3-5 business days. Once the verification finishes, your set up is complete!

Ready to go

Congratulations, you are now ready to begin using Payment Assistant!

Set up for success

Vendor records

Payables > Vendors

To ensure Payment Assistant can successfully send payments to vendors, it's important to have updated, accurate vendor records. We recommend you verify:

  • Vendor address, including city, state, and zip code.

  • Vendor contact information, including phone number. Optionally, we recommend you also complete the vendor email address, payee name, and primary contact first and last name. Vendor phone number and email address must have the correct phone number type.

Tip: If you don't verify vendor records in advance, you can also verify them during invoice entry.

For payment runs, phone numbers and email addresses on vendor records need to be formatted correctly. First, we recommend you update your phone type defaults.

  1. From Control Panel, select Fields and tables.

  2. Select Tables tab.

  3. Find and select the Phone Type.

  4. For each phone number type you want to use with Payment Assistant, edit the type and select Telephone number for the Phone number type.

  5. For each email address type you want to use with Payment Assistant, edit the type and select Email address for the Phone number type.

Then, ensure the contact info phone number is formatted correctly. These are the currently allowed phone number formats.

  • XXXXXXXXXXX i.e., 15555555555

  • X-XXX-XXX-XXXX i.e., 1-555-555-5555

  • X XXX XXX XXXX i.e., 1 555 555 5555

  • X.XXX.XXX.XXXX i.e., 1.555.555.5555

  • X (XXX) XXX-XXXX i.e., 1 (555) 555-5555

The country code is optional, but will default to 1 if not included.

If you have vendors with multiple customer numbers, we recommend that you create a separate vendor record for each customer number. If this is not possible, you could also put something generic in the customer number field, such as "MANY." Then, add the account number to the invoice description.

Invoice entry

Payables > Invoices

While you can update vendor and invoice contact information when you create a payment run, it's important to have invoice records that can process with Payment Assistant. Processing requires completing all the required fields on the invoice, including:

  • Vendor address, including city, state, and zip code.

    Note: Currently, only invoices with a United States remittance address can be processed with Payment Assistant.

  • Invoice number

  • Vendor customer number

  • Vendor contact information, including phone number

  • Payment method

    Tip: While you have to select a payment method on the invoice, Payment Assistant will use the preferred payment method chosen by the vendor and may differ from what you select.

Create a Payment Run

Payables > Payment Assistant

A payment run is a group of invoices you are ready to have approved and paid.  When you group them in a payment run, you are selecting which ones you are ready for Payment Assistant to withdraw the money from your bank account and pay the vendor. By grouping them, you also make it easy for the person who reviews payments to approve them.

  1. From Payables, select Payment Assistant.  After you complete the onboarding and setup, when you navigate to the Payment Assistant page, the Payment runs page appears.

  2. From the Payment runs page, select New.

  3. Select the invoices you are ready to pay. If an invoice is missing required info and can't be sent to Payment Assistant yet, a status appears in the Action needed column.

  4. Select Submit for approval. An email is sent to the user(s) who have the Payment Assistant role with the Approve payment runs task. We also display an in-product notification for the approver when they log in to Financial Edge NXT.

  5. The approver can view all the details of the payment run, including a summary and a list of the payments. Approval can be made in one of two places:

    • From the Payment runs page, select the menu for the row and then select Approve.

    • From Payment run record page, select Approve.

  6. Once the payment run is approved, Payment Assistant starts to process the payments, including withdrawing the funds from your bank account. It also marks the invoice and bank draft as paid.

    On the Payments run page, you can see the status of the payments for each payment run. This status can also be seen on the bank draft and the Payments tab of the Payment run record.

    • Pending approval – Payment run hasn't been approved yet. This means Payment Assistant can't start processing payments yet.

    • Approved - Awaiting funds – Payment run is being processed, but Payment Assistant hasn't received funds from your bank account yet.

    • Funded – The funds have been received from your bank account, but no vendors have been paid yet.

    • In-transit – The payments are in the process of being sent to vendors.

    • Paid (Partial) – One or more of the payments in the payment run are not paid. In some cases, it could be that the check is in the mail and not yet received. In other cases, a payment may be cancelled. For the payments that are cancelled, from the payment run, open each payment's bank draft record that did not complete and make any necessary changes to your records, such as voiding the payment.

      Warning: Only payment bank drafts that have a cancelled status for the payment run can be voided. If you need to stop a payment run for any other reason, contact Blackbaud Customer Support.

    • Paid – All vendors have received their payments.

Alternate option – Process payments with bank account

If you prefer, you can choose to process payments from the bank account record in Treasury.

  1. From Treasury, open the bank account record.

  2. Select Process payments.

  3. On the Select a payment method screen, select Payment Assistant and then Process payments. This option only appears for the bank account you selected to pay vendors from.

Vendor payments and experience

Payables > Invoices

The first time you include a payment for a vendor's invoice in a Payment Assistant payment run, Payment Assistant contacts the vendor and confirms how they preferred to be paid – virtual payment card, ACH, or check.

Vendors will be contacted by our partner, REPAY, to enroll in the Payment Assistant disbursement process. They can expect a real person to call (from 801-679-6044 or 801-762-8772) or an email (payableshelp@repay.com) as an agent of your organization. After the payment delivery method is agreed upon, Payment Assistant automates the rest of the contact.

Tip: If vendors do not respond to Payment Assistant's attempts to contact, we do not hold their funds. After the 1 day business hold is up on their funds, we send the payments by check. The next time a vendor has a payment, Payment Assistant attempts to contact the vendor again to set up their preferred payment method.

  • Virtual cards are one-time, unique credit cards, without a physical card attached. They are the fastest and most secure method of payment, so Payment Assistant attempts to set up payment via virtual card first.

    An email is sent to the vendor with the card number, expiration date, and security code for the approved amount. The vendor processes the card like any other card payments and receives the funds.

  • If virtual card is not preferred, Payment Assistant offers to set up ACH. ACH has no delay in payment and is preferred over physical check.

  • If the vendor cannot accept virtual cards or ACH, Payment Assistant will mail a check.

When a vendor is included in a payment run, Payment Assistant not only sends the payment, but it also handles notifying the vendor about the payment they are receiving. Payment Assistant emails the vendor with payment and invoice information. Unique emails are generated for ACH, check, and virtual card payments.

 

For more information about the vendor experience, see Payment Assistant for Vendors.

Reconciliation

Payables > Payment Assistant

Once a payment run is fully paid, you can set a default clear date for reconciliation.

  1. From the payment run record, select Set status to clear.

  2. Enter the clear date and select Save.