Payment and sending errors – Procountor

Payment and sending errors view lists all payments made from Procountor that have been rejected by the bank due to some kind of issue, such as insufficient funds. All payment error messages are received straight from the bank. Procountor forwards the error messages to the payer of the invoice. Fixed payments can be paid again with altered information in the Payment and sending errors view.

The Payment and sending errors view is accessed by choosing Management > Payment and sending errors.

When a payment results in an error with the bank’s processing, the bank informs the payer in two ways:

Some payment and sending error messages arrive straight to Procountor’s Payment and sending errors view from the bank. Information about the rejected payment is also always sent from Procountor by e-mail to the user that has made the rejected payment.
Some payment and sending error messages, that arrive to Procountor from the bank, are processed manually in Procountor. In these situations, the payment and sending errors are not visible in the Payment and sending errors view. The payer is informed by e-mail in these situations as well.

A notification about an unhandled payment or sending error

When a payment made from Procountor is rejected in the bank’s processing, the following symbol is shown in the top bar of Procountor:

By clicking the exclamation mark, a separate view that includes more information about the payment or sending error is opened. The error can be examined also in the Payment and sending errors view accessed from main menu (Management > Payment and sending errors).

The exclamation mark is shown to those users of Procountor that have at least viewing rights to the payment function and receipt type of the invoice in question. If an user has the additional service of Dimension-specific limitation of user rights in in use, the Payment and sending errors function can’t be used.

Error messages are always sent by the bank. The messages mean that a payment made from Procountor is rejected in the bank due to some reason. A message about the error is sent to the user that has made the payment. E-mail information for the notification message is retrieved from the Personal information and settings view of the user.

Payment and sending error procedures differ significantly with different banks. More information with specific examples is found in the end of this article.

Payment and sending errors view

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Manual for the function can be found by clicking Procountor's Info -button.

The Payment and sending errors view lists all payments that have been denied from the oldest to the newest.

By default, the unhandled payment and sending errors are listed when Unhandled is chosen as the Error status. However, it is also possible to search for the already handled payment and sending errors by choosing Handled as the Error status. In addition to this, the search results can be sorted with a time period: the date with payment and sending errors is the day that the error message has been received.

Search button searches for the errors according to search criteria.

Bank account information button is used to go to Management > Company info > Bank account information if there is a need for example to fix bank account details.

Handle button is used to handle the chosen payment error. This button opens a window with the following functions:

Remove payment transactions: This button removes a payment transaction that has resulted in an error. The payment transaction has to be removed in order to pay the invoice again or mark it to Marked paid status.
Re-queue for payment on the date XX: The receipt is paid again on the present day (open amount of the invoice as the payable sum).
- When you use this, the payment transaction will proceed with the same information as before. Please note! If, for example, the payment account used in the payment has been deactivated after the creation of the original payment transaction, the program does not check the account status and will use the deactivated account in the payment.
Mark as paid elsewhere: The receipt is set to status Marked paid. The payment is therefore not made from Procountor, but it is marked straight as paid.
It is possible to insert a comment about the payment error handling. The comment is visible in the Payment and sending errors view as additional information and in the Payment view of the receipt itself. The comment is obligatory if the payment transactions are not deleted.
Handle: This button handles the error and it is then removed from the list of unhandled errors. The previous payment transactions are removed from the receipt and / or new ones are added according to the selections made earlier.
Cancel: this button takes the user back to the list of payment errors without making any actions.

Payment button is used to go to the Payment view of the receipt where payment details are visible.

Invoice button is used to go to the Invoice view of the receipt where invoice details are visible.

The errors can be examined with the following column information in the search results:

Error message received: date of the error message
Type: payment or sending error
Error: reason of the error
Receipt: receipt type and number of the receipt
Handled: date of the handling
Handled by: the person responsible for the handling
Comment row: possible free-form comment to the error

Payment error types

Below is a list of errors that the user can handle and fix straight in Procountor. Error messages sent by the bank concerning these errors arrive to the Payment and sending errors view:

Not enough funds in the payment accounts

The bank account has not had enough Ffunds on the payment day in order to process the payment. In these situations, the payment has to be resent with the Payment function when enough funds are available. Another option is to change the payment account.

The payment transaction in error must be handled in the Payment and sending errors view and the payment transaction must be removed. The payment transaction can be removed by clicking the Remove payment transaction button in the view that opens from the Handle button. A payment transaction in Payment sent to bank status can be removed also in the Payment view by clicking Remove payment transaction button.

The payment resulted in error due to insufficient funds can be paid again with the Handle function if payment information, such as the payment account, doesn’t have to be changed. This action is done by selecting Re-queue for payment. The payment can also be made in the Payment view by clicking Pay button after the previous payment transaction has been removed. The payment will then be transferred to bank in the next payment run.

The address of the payee is missing

The bank has informed in the error message that recipient’s address is missing. Some foreign banks (for example Swedbank in Estonia, BIC code HABAEE2X) require that SEPA payments include also the address of the recipient. Setting the recipient’s address is possible when Foreign payment (in other words C2B payment or SEPA currency payment), is chosen as payment method in Payment view.

After the receipt’s payment transaction in status Payment sent to bank is removed, Foreign payment is chosen as the payment method in Payment view. The recipient’s address details can be filled in after this by clicking the pen symbol next to the text Recipient’s name and address. Payment is approved with clicking the Pay button. The payment will then be transferred to bank in the next payment run.

Problem with bank account settings or in the agreement with the bank

The bank rejects a payment with this error message when a faulty banking code has been saved to bank account information or a contract about payments has not yet been made with the bank (or the contract is not yet active).

It should be verified with the bank that a contract about making payments has been made. Bank connection authorizations can be used in drawing up the contract.

If a payment contract has been made, it is recommended to check the banking code (it can be called also for example service code, payment code, etc.) on the contract. Usually banking code is the business ID of the company without hyphen. Banking code can be changed in Management > Company info > Bank account information.

When the bank contract has been made or the banking code has been fixed, the payment in error has to be handled in the Payment and sending errors view and the payment transaction has to be removed. The payment transaction can be removed by clicking the Remove payment transaction button in the view that opens from the Handle button. A payment transaction in Payment sent to bank status can be removed also in the Payment view by clicking Remove payment transaction button. After the faulty information is fixed, the receipt can be paid again by clicking the Pay button. The payment will then be transferred to bank in the next payment run.

Please note!

When the Pay button is pressed, the invoice remains in the status payment queued until the payment day run. If the banking code is changed in the Bank account information view, it does not affect payments that are in the status payment queued . If the banking code is changed in the Bank account information view, previously made payments should be canceled and the Pay button pressed again so that the changed banking code is updated for the payment, and so that the payment is sent to the bank with the correct banking code.

Payee bank account number is invalid

This error message means that a payment has been rejected due to faulty IBAN account number or BIC code of the recipient. This information should be checked in Payment view or in Invoice view.

Does the IBAN account number equal to the BIC code; are these pieces of information from the same bank?

Is the IBAN account number in right form? Finnish IBAN should include 18 characters.

If the bank account and BIC code are correct, but the payment is a foreign payment, the recipient’s bank may not accept SEPA payments with the BIC code in question. It is recommended to contact the recipient or the recipient’s bank in these situations in order to get the right BIC code to be used with foreign payments.

Incorrect information can be fixed in the Payment view by entering the correct data to the fields Recipient account and Recipient BIC code. This action can be done after the invoice has been set to Unfinished status. After fixing the incorrect information, the receipt can be paid again by clicking Pay button. The payment will then be transferred to bank in the next payment run.

The payment cannot be made in the currency used

This error message is sent from the bank when the currency used in the payment is not allowed. Basically, this means that recipient’s account or payer’s account does not function with the selected currency. Therefore, the used currency has to be changed.

Incorrect information can be fixed after the invoice is returned back to Unfinished status. The invoice can be paid again in Payment view by clicking Pay button after the information has been corrected. The payment will then be transferred to bank in the next payment run.

Payment is paid late

This error means that an express payment has been rejected because the payment has been issued too late. After the daily processing times have expired, the express payments sent to the bank are rejected.

Nordea processes express payments in the following way:

Express payments to accounts in Nordea are processed from 7 am to 6 pm on banking days.
Express payments to accounts in different banks are processed from 8 am to 3:30 pm on banking days.
On short banking days, express payments to accounts in different banks are processed from 8 am to 11:30 am.

Danske Bank’s processing times: from 8 am to 4 pm

Samlink’s (Handelsbanken, Aktia, local units of Osuuspankki, Säästöpankki) processing times: from 8 am to 2:55 pm (until 11:55 am on short banking days)

After the previous payment transaction is removed, the payment can be made again as a normal bank transfer or express payment by changing the payment date to the next banking day. The payment is made by clicking Pay button in Payment view. The payment will then be transferred to bank in the next payment run.

Handling errors related to Direct bank transfers

When a payment has been made with the Direct bank transfer function (Payments > Direct bank transfer) and the payment results in an error, the following notification is visible in Direct bank transfer view:

Contrary to normal bank transfers, the following actions are not possible with direct bank transfers: deleting a payment transaction, re-queueing the payment and setting the Marked paid status in the payment and sending errors function. When a direct bank transfer has resulted in an error, a wholly new payment has to be made. For this reason, a payment error is handled in the following way:

Go to Payment and sending errors view from Management > Payment and sending errors.
The search can be defined with dates and by error status.
When the search criteria are set, click Search button.
After you have found the direct bank transfer that has resulted in an error, activate the row by clicking it and click the Handle button afterwards.
When the error has been handled, it disappears from the list. The payment will be visible in Invalidated status in the Direct bank transfer view.
If needed, create a new payment with the Direct bank transfer function (Payments > Direct bank transfer).

Handling errors related to salaries

A salary slip hat has received a payment error can be handled by deleting the salary list’s payment transaction in Payroll > Salary list search > View list > Payment > Salary payment.

Cancel the payment transaction by clicking Remove payment transaction Pay the salary slip resulted in error either with a bank transfer or with the salary payment function.
Paying with a bank transfer is done by choosing Go to > Payment > Bank transfer with the specific salary slip. A payment made with this function will show the recipient’s name and bank account number on the bank statement. Set the other salary slips on the salary list to Marked paid status.
When paying with the salary payment function, the salary slip resulted in error should be removed from the salary list. Return the slip to Unfinished status by clicking Edit button in the Invoice view and then click Invalidate After this, set other salary slips on the salary list to Marked paid status in Payment view. Create a new salary list with correct payment information for the salary slip that resulted in an error. Pay the slip then in the salary list’s page by choosing Payment > Salary payment from the top bar.

Payment and sending error notifications in the invoice details

Information about payment and sending errors is saved also in the Payment view of receipts. The information will be saved if the error message is received straight from the bank to the Payment and sending errors view in Procountor.

Invoice’s Payment view lists all payment transactions and transaction information concerning the invoice. When a payment has resulted in error, the payment transaction in question will have a reason of the error in the Reference / message field, highlighted in red. Simultaneously, a new transaction row is added to invoice’s transaction information by Procountor with a message of “Payment error”. This transaction indicates that the payment has resulted in an error. Also, the reason for the error is shown in the transaction information.

When the error is handled in Payment and sending errors view or by deleting the payment transaction in the Payment view of the invoice, a new row with a message of “Payment error handled” is added to the transaction information. The user’s name and a possible comment is also saved to the transaction information.

Examples about bank-specific differences with the handling of payment errors

When a bank account has insufficient funds to pay a single payment or a batch of payments, an error message is sent usually already after the banking day has ended. However, for example Danske Bank does not cancel payments waiting for funds immediately on the payment day. Instead of cancelling the payments immediately, the payments will be on hold for several days if enough funds will later be available. This kind of process means that the error message about insufficient funds does not arrive to Procountor immediately after the payment day. Other kinds of error messages, however, arrive instantly from Danske Bank. More information about error messages can be obtained from your own bank.

A single payment can include multiple errors, but banks can send only one error message at once. For this reason, the payment error messages are compiled in a way that the payers will get as much as information they can from a single error message. However, some error messages, like “insufficient funds”, can be very simple and unambiguous. Other error messages include multiple factors to be checked or fixed. For this reason, the payer should be in touch with the bank to get more detailed information if needed.

The following is an example of an error message with a lot of different factors. The bank forwards an error message with these words:

“… the payment has resulted in error because the given banking code does not match to any payment contract with Procountor as the intermediary.”

For example, the following factors can result in the previous error message:

The bank account used with the payment does not have an active payment contract with the bank in order to use Procountor to make payments.
Previously valid payment contract has been an object to changes that have been made lately for some reason.
The number in the Banking code column in Bank account information view does not correspond to the one in the payment contract made with the bank. (Banking code is a term used in Procountor. Banking code can be called also for example payment code, customer code or service code.)
All needed/desired payment methods have not been chosen to the payment contract. Some banks require that all payment methods have a separate contract. Other banks include all payment methods to a single payment contract. For example, with Nordea, salary payments (SEPASAL as payment type in Procountor) and currency payments (SEPALUM as payment type in Procountor) have to be agreed on separately in addition to bank transfers (SEPALMP as payment type in Procountor).
WS customer number column in the Bank account information view includes a number that does not correspond to the one in the payment contract made with the bank. At the moment, choosing WS customer number is obligatory with the accounts in Danske Bank, Nordea and Osuuspankki. The correct WS customer number should be verified from the bank in use. Nordea uses terms “contract number” and “user ID” about the WS customer number. Osuuspankki uses term “WS user ID”.

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