Processing payment transactions

On the Members24x7 system, "processing" a payment means reviewing it and changing its status depending on whether money has successfully changed hands.  Payment records are generated anytime a person encounters the Payment screen on the site - during new member registration, calendar/convention registration, store purchases, and more.  You will want to process all incoming payment transactions to ensure that you have an accurate record of what has been paid for and what has not.

If you are having trouble locating the record or records you wish to process, please see Finding payment transactions.

NOTE: Processing a payment by changing its payment status is for record-keeping only.  It does not change anything else on the website (such as a member's active status), nor does it actually cause money to change hands.  We recommend processing payment transactions so that you can keep track of who has paid for items and who has not.  Also, if you use credit card processing (see Payment authorization options), most of your credit card transactions will be processed automatically, though you still need to reconcile and archive them periodically.

Here is how to process a payment transaction:

1. Look at the Verification field if you want to determine how the person paid (that is, what method of payment they chose).  The possibilities are:

• AMS: The person paid by credit card and it was automatically processed through your Affiniscape Merchant Solutions account.  In this case, the status (see below) will be assigned automatically.  For more information, see Affiniscape Merchant Solutions.

• VeriSign: The person paid by credit card and it was automatically processed by VeriSign.  In this case, the status (see below) will be assigned automatically.  For more information on VeriSign, see online payment authorization options.

• PayPal: The person paid using the PayPal option.  Most sites do not enable this option; see setting up methods of payments for details.

• Invoiced: The person chose to pay by check.  This is only possible if you enable the pay by check / pay later feature when setting up methods of payments.

• Unknown: This happens when there is an error in the payment process and the person never submits a payment.  Either they closed their browser without paying, or something prevented them from submitting payment.

• Admin: An admin user made this payment record using the Admin Payment option (which allows an Admin to simply create a payment record of any status when paying, as opposed to choosing a payment method).

2. Look at the Status field to determine how to process the transaction.  Here are the possible statuses and what they mean:

• Pending: The transaction was created by someone paying with a credit card and it has not been processed (there was a problem communicating with the online merchant gateway). Contact the member to get the credit card number, and process the payment. When you finish processing the credit card, you should immediately change the status of the payment to Approved or Declined as appropriate.  This way, you will not mistakenly run the credit card twice, since it will not be Pending the next time you see the payment record.

• Verified: This status is used automatically by PayPal to show that a valid credit card was used and that the transaction can now be reviewed through the PayPal server.

• Approved: This status is used by VeriSign to indicate that the credit card transaction was successfully processed.   If you use VeriSign and you see this status, then the funds will be (or already have been) transferred to your merchant account automatically.

• Declined: The credit card was declined.  If you use AMS Plug'n Pay or Verisign, this status is assigned automatically when the credit card is processed and declined.

• Incomplete: The person submitting the form left the payment page without completing the payment information.  (This status is assigned by the system for all "Unknown" verifications.)  You should contact the submitter to see if they intended for the transaction to be processed.  In many cases, the person will attempt again and have a successful payment record that's more recent, so whenever you see an Incomplete transaction, you should check to make sure the person did not register or pay twice.  If they did, you can remove one registration/payment and just use the other.

• Cancelled: You can mark a payment record as Cancelled to indicate that it was a mistake or that no money will be sent.  For example, if a person accidentally double-registers for something, mark one of the payment records as Cancelled and don't charge them the second time.  As another example, if a person registers for an event by check but then never sends a check, you should delete them as an attendee and mark the payment status to Cancelled.

• Receivable: The transaction was created by someone who is sending in payment with a check.  When you receive the check, you should change the status of this payment to Complete.  If the check is not received and you decide to cancel whatever the person paid for, you can mark the payment record as Cancelled to signal that you are no longer expecting a check.

• Complete: You can mark a payment record as Complete when it is fully processed.  Normally, this is used for admin payment records.  You can mark manual credit card transactions as Complete when you process them, although you can also mark them as Approved or Success if you prefer.  Also, there's a Paid status that you can use for received checks and similar situations.  As long as you are consistent, you can use the status setting that you choose.

• Success: This status is used by Plug'n Pay to indicate that a credit card was successfully processed.  If you see this status and you use Affiniscape Merchant Solutions, then the funds will be (or already have been) transferred to your merchant account automatically.  
   

• BadCard: If you use Plug'n Pay, this status is used in rare situations where the card information is invalid (for example, the card number and expiration date don't match).  Usually, this is detected before the transaction is finished, so you will rarely see this status.

• Problem: If you use Plug'n Pay, this status is used in rare situations where there was an error of some kind with the credit card transaction.  These errors are usually non-standard, so feel free to send a support request if you get this status and are not sure how to handle it.

• Paid: You can mark a payment record as Paid when it is fully paid for.  Normally, this is used when check payments are received.  This status is similar to Complete, so just make sure you're consistent in how you assign statuses.

1. If you are working with a credit card payment (that is, the Verification is AMS, or VeriSign), you will have an additional button that says .  Click it to get additional details about the transaction, including any extra credit card payment fields such as Billing Address (see Credit card setup for more information on adding payment fields) and any AMS or VeriSign info.  You can then click the button again to hide the information.
   
   You can also open the Transaction Details for all the records on the page at once by clicking at the top left.  You can then hide all the details by clicking .

2. To change the status of a payment, click the button under the payment record in question.  This brings up a page with detailed information about the payment.  Look for the dropdown box at the bottom, and choose a new status for the payment.  If you like, you can add notes to the transaction as well, such as a check number and date for Invoiced transactions.  Then scroll to the bottom of the page and click Submit.  See the two examples that follow.

• Example: Let's say you have an Invoiced transaction whose status is currently Receivable.  Let's also assume that you received the check for that transaction and have successfully deposited it.  You should change the status of the payment to Complete to indicate that the money has successfully changed hands.  You can also type the check number, deposit date, and any other notes you wish into the Notes field.
  
  If the check bounced, or you never received the check, you would contact the person to see if alternate payment can be arranged.  If no other payment is made, you should change the payment status to Cancelled to indicate that the money never changed hands.  You would also cancel whatever the person had paid for (member registration, calendar event registration, etc.).

3. You can access the original item paid for by clicking the button.  This will pop open the admin page related to the purchased item in a new window so you can make changes if necessary.
   
   For example, let's say that you're looking at a duplicate payment record for a new member registration (someone registered twice by accident), or a credit card payment that was declined for a registration.  In either case, you will want to remove the registrant from your database.  Click the button, and the Register/Renewal Report showing that person will pop open in a new window.  From there, you can delete the member, edit their record, or anything else you could normally do for that page.  Similar pages are available for event attendees and other payment items.

4. If a payment will not require any further attention (for example, it is "Complete" or "Approved"), you can archive it by clicking on the button.  This "hides" the payment transaction, since by default only current payments are shown.  You can always click the  Archived or  All tab at the top left if you need access to archived payments.
   
   Archiving a payment is like putting it in a recycle bin that's never emptied.  You cannot delete payment records (for liability purposes), but archiving a payment is like deleting it, except that you can still get to it at any time.  You can reinstate an archived payment at any time by clicking .
   
   You can also archive (or reinstate) multiple payment records by checking them off and clicking Archive/Reinstate All Checked Records at the bottom. You can also click at the top to reverse the archive status of all the payment records you have currently filtered to.  NOTE: If you choose this option, then you will very likely see no payment records listed until you change your archive tab setting or clear your filters.

As you process payments, the system will record the system ID number of the last person to modify the record.  You will see this when you edit a record using - it is listed at the bottom.  If the number is 0, then the payment was made by a site visitor who wasn't logged in and it hasn't yet been modified.  If the number is other than 0, then it will be a link to the profile of the person who either made the payment or last modified it administratively.