Maksuvahti

What is Maksuvahti?

Maksuvahti is a reminder and debt-collection service integrated into the Procountor software with automatic tracking of payments. With the service, you can collect your outstanding receivables efficiently and easily without damaging the customer relationship in spite of temporary payment difficulties. With Maksuvahti’s automatic payment tracking, you can automate payment reminders. Up-to-date reminders help ensure that the receivables are paid as quickly as possible.

The service is provided in cooperation with our partner Kravia Finland Oy and it is available directly through Procountor.

The full pricing and terms and conditions of Maksuvahti can be found here.

 

Information required before setting up the service

Before the set-up process of Maksuvahti, please ensure that:

• The following information has been added to the Management > Company info > Basic info -page:
  • Company ID
  • Street address (if a P.O. box is used, enter it in this field)
  • Postal code and city
• The following information has been added to the Management > Company info > Bank account information -page:
  • Active bank account
  • All active bank accounts have a BIC

 

Set-Up

1. The set-up starts in Procountor by selecting Maksuvahti (Kravia) from the collection partner menu under Management> Company info > Debt collection settings > Collection partner settings > Collection partner.
2. After this, start the set-up of Maksuvahti by clicking on the Save button at the top. In the set-up process, remember to read and accept the adding of API user (maksuvahti.api) and the terms of use and fill out the requested company information, contact person information and customer identification information that Procountor automatically sends to Kravia Finland Oy. You can specify the company’s representative or, for example, the accountant as the contact person. This person does not have to be set up as a user of Procountor. More information about the importance of the contact person is in the following paragraph.
3. When the information has been sent from Procountor, Kravia will continue the set-up. The contract person specified during set-up will have admin rights to Kravia’s customer portal, and Kravia will send them the agreement for signing. The signature requires strong identification. If the contact person is not authorized to sign on behalf of the company, they must forward the agreement sent by Kravia to an authorized signatory. The contact person may also invite other persons, such as the accountant, to use the Kravia customer portal, in which case the accountant can manage debt collection on behalf of the company. If the accountant was specified as the contact person during set-up, they will gain direct access to Kravia’s customer portal without separate invitation.
4. After signing the contract, you can transfer invoices to Maksuvahti. If invoices are transferred to Maksuvahti before signing the contract, the invoices must be separately approved in Kravia's customer portal so that reminders and collection measures are initiated for the invoices in question.
5. If you wish, you can turn on automation to transfer unpaid invoices to Maksuvahti. See below for more information.

 

Use of Maksuvahti

Reminder and acceptance settings in Maksuvahti

In Maksuvahti, you can decide whether to send one or two payment reminders for your unpaid invoices, as well as determine which steps require your separate approval before the process can proceed. By default, Maksuvahti sends one payment reminder and your approval is always required before any legal collection measures are initiated. If you wish, you may modify these settings.

To set your reminder and approval settings, go to Management > Company info > Debt collection settings > Collection partner settings > Payment reminder and additional settings for Maksuvahti. The section is shown, after the set-up of Maksuvahti. The onboarding of Maksuvahti takes a couple of minutes. 

• Send additional payment reminder: By default, Maksuvahti sends one payment reminder before a possible transfer to debt collection (= sending a debt collection letter). You can choose to use this option if you want Maksuvahti to send another payment reminder before a possible transfer to debt collection.
• With the option Approve cases before sending payment demand, all receivables will be subject to your approval before a debt collection letter is submitted for the receivables. Kravia will send an email notification when the receivables are awaiting approval. By default, the email will be sent to the client’s specified contact email address. The approval is given in the Kravia customer portal.
• With the option Approve cases before starting legal collection, all receivables will be subject to your approval before legal collection measures are initiated for the receivables. Kravia will send an email notification when the receivables are awaiting approval. By default, the email will be sent to the client’s specified contact email address. The approval is given in the Kravia customer portal.
  • If you want to approve cases before starting legal collection, you must have Admin -rights in Kravia customer portal. The contract person specified during set-up will have admin rights to Kravia’s customer portal.

The settings can also be adjusted in Kravia's customer portal, in which case the information will also be automatically updated in Procountor.

 

Automatically transferring invoices to Maksuvahti

To enable automation in Maksuvahti’s automatic collection settings, go to Management > Company info > Debt collection settings > Collection partner settings > Settings for automatic transferring to Maksuvahti > Use automatic transferring to Maksuvahti.

In Maksuvahti's automatic collection settings, you can configure Maksuvahti's automatic settings:

• The Use automatic transferring to Maksuvahti option determines whether automation is enabled or disabled. By default, the invoices of all customers are transferred automatically. If you want to disable the automatic transfer of invoices for some customers, you can do this in the Prevent automatic transferring section (see below).
• In the Minimum invoice amount field, you can enter the desired minimum amount for an invoice. Any invoices exceeding the amount fall within the scope of automation.
• In the Waiting time after the due date in days section, you can set a time limit for how soon after the due date unpaid invoices are automatically transferred to Maksuvahti from where the payment reminder is sent. You can specify a different period for receivables from companies and consumers. Receivables from companies are payments by customers whose invoice contains a Finnish, Swedish or Danish business ID. Receivables from other customers are treated as consumer receivables. By default, the fields contain minimum values in accordance with the law and good practice. When the automatic transfer is enabled, the invoice date does not affect the waiting period, unlike in manual transfers where the waiting time is calculated from the invoice date.
• In the Prevent automatic transferring section, you can select a business partner group whose invoices you do not want to transfer automatically to Maksuvahti. You can use an existing business partner group for this purpose or set up a new group. If you need to prevent the automation for several business partner groups, you can use a main group.

Only the invoices with a due date on or after the date on which the automatic transfer was enabled will be transferred automatically to Maksuvahti. Invoices that fell due before the automatic transfer was enabled must be manually sent to Maksuvahti using the payment reminder function. These invoices will not be automatically transferred to Maksuvahti.

EXAMPLE: The automatic transfer to Maksuvahti is enabled on September 20. The automatic transfer does not cover invoices that fell due on or before September 19. If you specified seven (7) days as the waiting period for receivables from companies and fourteen (14) days for receivables from consumers, the receivable from companies that are overdue on September 20 will be transferred to Maksuvahti on September 27 and the receivables from consumers on October 4.

When automation is enabled, invoices are automatically transferred to Maksuvahti when the conditions defined in the automation settings are met. Kravia takes care of payment reminders and the collection of the payment with regard to the transferred invoice. Kravia starts the collection process by sending a payment reminder. If the debtor does not act after receiving the payment reminders, the debt is sent to collections; in other words, Kravia sends a debt collection letter. You can monitor the progress of the debt collection in the Kravia customer portal.

Only invoices with the status Sent or Partly paid are covered by the automatic transfer.

Invoices for which you have sent a payment reminder in Procountor are not transferred automatically to Maksuvahti. However, you can transfer a receivable manually from the Payment reminder function to Maksuvahti for debt collection, even if you have already sent a payment reminder from Procountor.

Receivables that have been transferred to a different collection service provider are also not covered by the automatic transfer. This prevents targeting multiple collection measures at the same debtor.

 

Transferring invoices manually to Maksuvahti

A sales invoice can be transferred to Maksuvahti when:

• 14 days have passed since the invoice date and 7 days since the due date in intercompany invoicing
• 28 days have passed since the invoice date and 14 days since the due date in consumer invoicing

Receivables from companies are payments by customers whose invoice contains a Finnish, Swedish or Danish business ID. Receivables from other customers are treated as consumer receivables.

The overdue sales invoice is transferred to Maksuvahti in Procountor's Payment reminder function. Go to the Payment reminder view by searching for receipts and retrieve the invoices that are to be collected.

• When the invoices are selected, click on the Start Maksuvahti service button.
• Procountor will ask you to confirm the transfer to Maksuvahti. The window shows how many invoices are being transferred to the service.
• The transfer is approved by selecting I confirm the transfer of data. Click Continue to transfer the data to the Maksuvahti service.

After the transfer, Kravia takes care of payment reminders and the collection of the payment with regard to the transferred invoice. Kravia starts the collection process by sending a payment reminder. If the debtor does not act after receiving the payment reminders, the debt is sent to collections; in other words, Kravia sends a debt collection letter. You can monitor the progress of the debt collection in the Kravia customer portal.

However, if you transfer an invoice to Maksuvahti after sending a payment reminder from Procountor, the process always starts with the sending of a debt collection letter. Information of the debt collection expenses related to previous payment reminders are sent to Kravia, and Kravia continues to collect the collection costs related to these previous payment reminders. In this case, the collection cost limits regarding the previously sent payment reminders must be taken into account. The cost item is created in Procountor on the basis of the collection cost product:

• EUR 12 for intercompany receivables.
• EUR 5 for consumer receivables.

An invoice can only be transferred to Maksuvahti if the collection costs related to earlier payment reminders do not exceed these limits. These limits represent the total of costs that would be transferred to Maksuvahti with the invoice. The number of reminders is not limited.

EXAMPLE 1: Two payment reminders have been sent to a company from Procountor, and the collection cost in each was EUR 5. When this receivable is transferred to Maksuvahti, the collection costs total EUR 10, which does not exceed the collection cost limit specified for intercompany receivables (EUR 12). If the collection cost per invoice were EUR 8, the total of costs would be EUR 16, which is above the limit. In this case, the receivable could not be transferred to Maksuvahti.

EXAMPLE 2: Three payment reminders have been sent to a consumer from Procountor without a debt collection fee. This receivable can be transferred to Maksuvahti, because the total of debt collection costs is EUR 0, and the cost limit for consumer receivables (EUR 5) is not exceeded.

 

MONITORING OF RECEIVABLES TRANSFERRED TO MAKSUVAHTI AND PERFORMING ACTIONS

After activating the service, you will receive an email from Kravia with instructions for registering in Kravia's customer portal. In the customer portal, you can monitor the status of receivables transferred to Maksuvahti and perform actions on the receivables. For example, you can stop or suspend debt collection and accept the initiation of legal collection for the receivables in the customer portal. Later in the autumn, we will develop additional features that make it possible to see the status of receivables and the measures taken directly in Procountor.

Kravia will send an email notification when your approval or other measures are required. You can perform the required actions in Kravia's customer portal.

You can log in to Kravia's customer portal here.

Instructions for using Kravia's customer portal can be found here (in Finnish).

 

Please note regarding Maksuvahti

• In the Maksuvahti set-up process, Procountor automatically creates an API user named maksuvahti.api under Management > Users and user rights (new). As the maksuvahti.api user is required for the use of Maksuvahti, please do not delete the user.

 

Processing credit notes

Credit notes for invoices transferred to Maksuvahti are created in the usual way and the information does not need to be submitted to Maksuvahti separately as Procountor automatically sends the information to Kravia.

 

Payments to forwarded invoices

If unpaid sales invoices that have already been sent to Maksuvahti are subject to payment transactions in Procountor, the payment information will be automatically sent to Kravia.

 

Settlement of reveivables paid

Kravia settles the cash transactions received for its assignments as reference payments, and these will be automatically allocated to the invoice in Procountor’s accounts ledger.