In a previous article, we discussed Calculating Late Charges and some things to consider when doing so. Our discussion assumed your Late Charge services were already setup and ready for calculation. Let’s expand on this and discuss Setting up Late Charges and some of the features and flexibility available when doing so.
You can define your Late Charge Services as you would any other service, within the Service Types Maintenance form. Any service defined using Calculation Type 3 will be considered a Late Charge service. You are not limited to only one Late Charge service; in fact, you can have as many as you wish. If you want to add more, you simply assign unique Late Charge Group ID numbers to each one. Once they are all setup, they can be associated to any of your other services by assigning the appropriate Late Charge Group ID for each Service definition. When you add services to your accounts, remember to add their related Late Charge services as well. Adding multiple Late Charge services allows you to separate their detail and summary information based on the individual or groups of services they are associated with.
The rates that are used when calculating Late Charges are very versatile. These rates are defined within the Late Charge Types Maintenance form. You can charge a Flat Amount, a percentage of an amount that is late, a combination of both, along with minimum and maximum fees. You can setup multiple levels of rates based on the number of days an amount is late. All levels comprise a rate definition. You can setup as many rate definitions as you wish. These rate definitions are then assigned to your accounts as appropriate. Any Late Charge services added to an account will use the rate definition assigned to that account. Adding multiple rate definitions allows you to charge your customers different rates for the same Late Charge services if necessary.
While this may be an extensive list of features and flexibility, you do not necessarily need to utilize all of them to their full extent. We suggest you try not to over complicate your setup with items that you do not need, but instead utilize the features and flexibility on a level that is necessary to satisfy your Late Charge billing requirements.