This chapter describes how to administer the ongoing functions in Oracle Advanced Collections such as running concurrent programs.
This chapter covers the following topics:
Oracle Advanced Collections provides preconfigured scoring components, scoring engines, work item templates, strategy templates, metrics formulas, and correspondence templates and queries to use with the application.
You can use these features without any additional setup during the testing phase of your implementation. You can also use these preconfigured elements in your live production environment if they suit your business needs.
For more information on the preconfigured components, see: Preconfigured Correspondence Templates, Oracle Advanced Collections Implementation Guide, Preconfigured Scoring Engines, Oracle Advanced Collections Implementation Guide, Preconfigured Scoring Components, Oracle Advanced Collections Implementation Guide, Preconfigured Strategy Templates, Oracle Advanced Collections Implementation Guide, Preconfigured Strategy Work Items, Oracle Advanced Collections Implementation Guide.
Oracle Advanced Collections uses concurrent programs to run batch processes behind the scenes. The administrator is responsible for setting up the parameters for each concurrent program. Each concurrent program runs at the lowest responsibility level, and can be set to run at multiple responsibility or organization levels. For example, administrators can login by country (different responsibilities) and set different parameters to use when running the same concurrent program. The default is set to run at the site level.
When you run a concurrent program, it runs across all operating units in your organization unless you specify an operating unit as one of the parameters.
For detailed instructions for running and maintaining concurrent programs, refer to the Managing Concurrent Processing and Concurrent Programs, Oracle E-Business Suite System Administrator's Guide - Maintenance.
You can use concurrent programs in Advanced Collections to create delinquencies, reconcile promises, assign strategies, execute dunning plans, initialize Credit Management customer information, process Oracle Lease and Finance Management functionality, and more. The concurrent programs and the order you execute them will vary depending on whether you are running Strategies or Dunning Plans, and whether or not you leverage Oracle Lease and Finance Management.
Run concurrent programs as often as you need to keep your operational systems current. For example, if you assign strategy work items every day, then run the IEX: Strategy Management current program daily. If you send dunning notices only at the beginning of a billing cycle, then run IEX: Send Dunnings for Delinquent Customers every month at that time.
When you use Strategies, you need to run the following concurrent programs in this order:
Workflow Background Process: IEX: Collection Strategy Workflow: Initiates the execution of assigned strategies and continues monitoring strategies in progress.
Parameters
Work Item: IEX: Collection Strategy Work Flow
Processed Deferred: Yes
Process Timed Out: Yes
Workflow Background Process: IEX: Strategy Fulfillment Mailer: Executes automated correspondence work items for strategies.
Parameters
Work Item: IEX: Strategy Fulfillment Mailer
Processed Deferred: Yes
Process Timed Out: Yes
IEX: Promise Reconciliation: Verifies if payments were posted for promises; creates broken promise items for UWQ.
IEX: Scoring Engine Harness: Scores and creates delinquencies, and scores customer, accounts, and bill-to locations. Add up to five scoring engines to the scoring engine harness. For more information see: Concurrent Programs for Scoring, Oracle Advanced Collections Implementation Guide and Preconfigured Scoring Engines, Oracle Advanced Collections Implementation Guide.
IEX: Strategy Management: Compares the object's score with available strategies' ranks and assign appropriate strategies. It also creates work items in active strategies.
Parameters
Operating Unit: Used for viewing and assigning strategies based on the multiple operating unit levels as specified in the checklist.
Ignore Change Strategy Switch: If set to Yes, the Strategy Management program does not dynamically change the strategy assigned to an object if the score is outside the tolerance level set for the strategy. Ignoring dynamic strategy changing improves system performance. The default is No.
IEX: Assign Collections Level: Interfaces the migrated data from the legacy systems to Oracle Advanced Collections and assigns a specific default Collections level to the migrated segment of customers.
Remember that each concurrent program must be completed before the subsequent concurrent program is submitted to ensure the accuracy of the data and programs.
When you are running Dunning Plans, you will need to run the following concurrent programs in this order:
IEX: Promise Reconciliation: Verifies if payments were posted for invoices with promises; creates broken promise items for UWQ.
IEX: Scoring Engine Harness: Scores and creates delinquencies, and scores customers, accounts, or bill-to locations. Add up to five scoring engines to the scoring engine harness. For more information see: Concurrent Programs for Scoring, Oracle Advanced Collections Implementation Guide and Preconfigured Scoring Engines, Oracle Advanced Collections Implementation Guide.
IEX: Send Dunnings for Delinquent Customers: Compares the score of the object with the active dunning plan and sends the dunning letters for all appropriate delinquent customers.
IEX: Dunning and Broken Promise Call Backs: Reviews the dunning plan and creates all necessary callback tasks for delinquent customers.
Remember that each concurrent program must be completed before the subsequent concurrent program is submitted to ensure the accuracy of the data and programs.
Use the IEX Populate UWQ Summary Table concurrent program to update delinquent customer data in the Collector's Work Queue. This program consolidates information from the following sources and summarizes it in the IEX_DLN_UWQ_SUMMARY table:
Credit summary information from the AR_TRX_BAL_SUMMARY table
Trading Community Architecture (TCA) data from the HZ_PARTIES and HZ: CONTACT POINTS tables
Delinquency information from IEX_DELINQUENCIES_ALL AND IEX_PROMISES tables
The data in the Collector's Work Queue refreshes each time you run the IEX: Populate UWQ Summary Table concurrent program.
Note: This program displays information in the Collectors Work Queue only for the operational data level at which you run strategies. For example, if you run strategies at the account level, the concurrent program will only summarize information for the account level nodes.
The Active, Pending, and Complete subnodes display the total number of delinquencies for the primary node and do not break out the number by subnode status.
Data refreshes after the concurrent program completes.
Parameters
From Date: Leave the parameter blank to run the program in total refresh mode or enter the date the program last ran for incremental mode.
The first time you run this program, leave the From Date parameter blank to initialize and load the data. Then schedule the program to run daily in incremental mode. Enter the date of the previous run in the From Date parameter.
Schedule the program to run periodically with the parameter set to null to ensure all data is captured. Since a total refresh can take several hours to run if your database is large, schedule this to run weekly or at a frequency suitable to you business operations. If the total refresh takes less than 30 minutes to run, you can run the program in total refresh mode more frequently.
Operating Unit: Used for viewing and assigning strategies based on the multiple operating unit levels as specified in the checklist.
The IEX: Populate UWQ Summary Tables concurrent program is submitted only once. The summary program loops for each default collections definition level specified in the Operational Setup. The UWQ summary data is populated for each party based on Collections level only one node at a time. The Collections Definition levels enables the UWQ nodes automatically.
Truncate: When the From Date value is given, then Truncate value defaults to No and cannot be changed. But if the From Date value is NOT given, then Truncate value defaults to Yes and it truncates the IEX_DLN_UWQ_SUMMARY table even though it's processing for single operating unit.
The IEX: Populate UWQ Summary Tables concurrent program is submitted only once. The summary program loops for each default collections definition level specified in the Operational Setup. The UWQ summary data is populated for each party based on Collections level only one node at a time. The Collections Definition levels enables the UWQ nodes automatically.
Generate Territory Packages
IEX: Territory Assignment: defaults to the Multiple Collections level as defined and configured by the Collection Administrator to assign collectors at multiple Collections levels.
Run this program as needed to assign collectors based on collections usage.
You can run the following administrative concurrent programs periodically for system maintenance:
IEX: Clear Delinquency Buffers Table
Run this program to clear the buffer tables used in scoring. Run it only if the scoring concurrent program stops before completing. Do not run this program while any other programs are running.
IEX: Create Dunning and Broken Promise Call Backs
This program reviews dunning plans and promises and creates all necessary callback tasks in the Task node on the Collector's Work Queue for delinquent customers. Run this program daily.
IEX: Purge Score History Table
This program purges historical data stored in the IEX_SCORE_HISTORIES table. Run this after scoring if you do not want to save historical scoring data. Clearing the table improves performance and does not affect information available to collectors.
If you maintain score history, run this program infrequently, such as weekly or monthly, to reduce the amount of data stored.
Parameters
Truncate all data: Set to Yes to clear all data from the table quickly. If set to No then table data is purged row by row. Leave this parameter blank if you want purge data using other parameters.
Score Object ID: Purge data for a single customer.
Score Object Code: Purge data for a single object, such as party or transaction.
Request ID: Purge data for a specific scoring engine harness concurrent request ID.
Save Last Run: Set to Yes to save only data from the last time the scoring engine harness ran.
Batch Size: Set the size of the purge batches. Recommended value is 100,000 to 200,000.
IEX: Refresh Metric Summary Table
Use this program to update metric information if you run metrics in batch mode.
IEX: Populate UWQ Summary Table
Use this program to initialize and maintain customer information in the Collector's Work Queue.
Refresh AR Transactions Summary Table
Use this program to initialize and maintain customer information.
Oracle Lease and Finance Management uses the following concurrent programs:
IEX: Case Owner Load Balancing
This concurrent program balances the number of cases assigned to collectors. This allows the Owner information to appear in the Case Management tab.
Customers will be notified of the intent to report them to the credit bureau through the Report to Credit Bureau Screen. Pending notifications are created in the open interface, which are then to be processed. This concurrent program picks up all pending records and sends notifications to the customer using Oracle One-to-One Fulfillment.
Parameters
Object Type: This specifies the type of objects, which are to be processed by this API. Currently it is defaulted to OKX_LEASE. At the time of implementation, the underlying API can be extended to process other object types. This parameter is mandatory.
Case Number: This specifies the case number of the records to be processed. This parameter is optional. If this parameter is populated, only customers assigned to that case are notified.
Party ID: This specifies the party ID of the records to be processed. This parameter is optional. If this parameter is populated, notifications are sent out only for those cases belonging to this party ID.
Agent ID: This parameter is necessitated by the call to One-to-One Fulfillment. If it is not provided, a user profile value will be used.
Content ID: This identifies the fulfillment template that is used for customer notification. If it is not provided, a user profile value will be used.
From: This is the FROM EMAIL ID of the e-mail sent to the customer, by the concurrent notification API, to notify about intent to report to the credit bureau. If it is not provided, a user profile value will be used.
Subject: This is the subject of the e-mail sent to the customer, by the concurrent notification API, to notify about intent to report to the credit bureau. If it is not provided, a user profile value will be used.
E-mail: This parameter is provided in case a notification is to be sent to a single customer (run the concurrent program on an ad hoc basis). If this parameter is specified, then the case number parameter must be specified along with this.
Used to inform the external agency about the recall of a case, which has been assigned to them. A pending notification will be created for the external agency.
Parameters
Object Type: This specifies the type of objects, which are to be processed by this API. Currently it is defaulted to OKX_LEASE. At the time of implementation, the underlying API can be extended to process other object types. This parameter is mandatory.
Case Number: This specifies the case number of the records to be processed. This parameter is optional. If this parameter is populated, only the external agency, to which the case is assigned, is notified.
External Agency ID: This specifies the external agency ID of the records to be processed. This parameter is optional. If this parameter is populated, notifications are sent out only to this external agency.
Agent ID: This parameter is necessitated by the call to One-to-One Fulfillment. If it is not provided, a user profile value will be used.
Content ID: This identifies the fulfillment template that is used for external agency notification. If it is not provided, a user profile value will be used.
From: This is the FROM EMAIL ID of the e-mail sent to the external agency, by the concurrent notification API. If it is not provided, a user profile value will be used.
Subject: This is the subject of the e-mail sent to the external agency, by the concurrent notification API. If it is not provided, a user profile value will be used.
E-mail: This parameter is provided in case a notification is to be sent to a single external agency (run the concurrent program on an ad hoc basis). If this parameter is specified, then the case number parameter must be specified along with this.
Records are inserted into the open interface with a pending status, as part of the Report to Credit Bureau, Transfer to External Agency, with only the mandatory fields populated. This concurrent program then populates the rest of the information and updates the status of the record to indicate that it has been processed.
Parameters
Object Type: This specifies the type of objects, which are to be processed. Currently it is defaulted to OKX_LEASE. At the time of implementation, the underlying API can be extended to process other object types. This parameter is mandatory.
Case Number: This specifies the case number of the records to be processed. This parameter is optional. If this parameter is populated, only records belonging to that case will be processed.
Recalls a case from an external agency. Cases marked for recall are actually recalled by this program.
Parameters
Object Type: This specifies the type of objects to be processed by this API. Currently it is defaulted to OKX_LEASE. At the time of implementation, the underlying API can be extended to process other object types. This parameter is mandatory.
Case Number: This specifies the case number of the records to be processed. This parameter is optional. If this parameter is populated, only customers assigned to that case are notified.
External Agency ID: This parameter is provided in case this program is to be run for a single external agency (run the concurrent program on an ad hoc basis).
Comments: This parameter is provided when this program is run for a single external agency (run the concurrent program on an ad hoc basis). A comment can be entered using this parameter.
This concurrent program retrieves Contract information from the system to be reported to credit bureaus. It accepts no parameters. It inserts Contract data into an interface table, from which the user organization can retrieve the data, format appropriately and send it as a report to the appropriate Credit Bureau. The status of records when inserted into this table is "Pending". The IEX: Process Pending concurrent program must be run in order to retrieve complete details on all the contracts to be inserted into the interface table.
Used to inform the external agency of the intent to recall a case, which has been assigned to them. A notification will be created for the external agency and a review task will be created for the collections agent so that the case can be reviewed and a decision can be made about the case recall.
Parameters
Object Type: This specifies the type of objects to be processed by this API. Currently it is defaulted to OKX_LEASE, which represents cases consisting of multiple Lease Contracts. At the time of implementation, the underlying API can be extended to process other object types. This parameter is mandatory.
Case Number: This specifies the case number of the records to be processed. This parameter is optional. If this parameter is populated, only customers assigned to that case are notified.
External Agency ID: This parameter is provided in case this program is to be run for a single external agency (run the concurrent program on an ad hoc basis).
Comments: This parameter is provided when this program is run for a single external agency (run the concurrent program on an ad hoc basis). A comment can be entered using this parameter.