Understanding the Collections Workbench

The PeopleSoft Receivables Collections Workbench is a central work space that presents a complete view of each customer. Collectors can perform their day-to-day activities, including accessing and completing action items directly from the Collections Workbench. Prior to contacting a customer or completing an action, the collector can use the Collections Workbench to review a customer's history, such as the average days it takes a customer to pay, the number of days any sales are outstanding (DSO), any past due balances, and any previous broken promises. With this information at hand, the collector can contact the customer and hopefully, work out a plan for payment and indicate on the Collections Workbench that the customer will pay by direct debit, credit card, or a check. If the customer does not make a commitment to pay, the collector can use the Collections Workbench to place the customer on credit hold and add an action to follow up in a specified number of days. If the customer agrees to pay within a certain number of days and does not pay, the collector can use the Collections Workbench to send a dunning letter. The collector can continue to follow-up with this customer, and, after reviewing several broken promises, can use the Collections Workbench to mark the customer in collections and refer the customer to a collection agency. The Collections Workbench provides the collector all of the information and metrics needed to diligently track and manage customer data from the days the customer receives a statement until it is paid or referred to a collection agency.

Collections managers can use the Collections Workbench to complete day-to-day management activities, which may include reviewing the current payment promises, reviewing any outstanding broken promises, the reassigning action items to different members of their team, or completing their own assigned action items.

The Collections Workbench enables an authorized user to:

Easily access and populate the workbench data.
Navigate to and from multiple pages and levels of data.
Personalize the workbench.
Access an enhanced owner action list and view action lists across customers.
Access specific levels of customer detail.
Display the credit profile information of a customer.
Display and work the item list associated with a customer.
Display the payment status and payment history of a customer.
Review customer promises.
Review, add, update, and delete conversations with a customer.
Review the correspondence history of a customer and send statements by e-mail.
Review customer aging and open credit information.
Calculate a credit risk score for a customer.

Integrating with PeopleSoft Contracts

If your PeopleSoft 9.2 installation includes Contracts and Financials, you can leverage the Collections Workbench for payments associated with contracts. This expanded Collections Workbench functionality extends collections to contracts based on detailed item references and worksheets.

The Collections Workbench integrated with Contracts enables an authorized user to:

Review balance and past due amounts by contract or contract line.
Display and work the item list associated with a contract.
Display the payment status and payment history by contract.
Review, add, and update conversations that reference a contract.

If you enter both customer and contract criteria, the system matches contracts payment items, including credit items, payments, drafts, and direct debits, from all customers in the defined hierarchy.

See also the product documentation for PeopleSoft Contracts.

Collections Workbench Access and Population

You can easily access customer data on the workbench by searching for or entering a customer ID in the Collections Workbench header. When you enter the header information, your user ID is used to generate an action list in the Action List group box, which lists any actions assigned to you that apply to the selected customer. Customer detail information also appears for the selected customer in the Customer Details group box along with tabs on which you can review:

A credit profile of the customer.
Any payment activity by this customer.
A list of items purchased and the details regarding the purchase and payment of each item.
A list of conversations with this customer.
A history of correspondence with this customer in the form of statements and dunning letters
Customer aging details.
A multilevel customer hierarchy, which displays the item balance, past due balance, and credit limit for each customer in the hierarchy with rolled up information that customers defined within the hierarchy.

You can also leave some of the header information blank, such as the Unit field and the Customer ID field to display multiple customers who are associated with your user ID and have new or pending actions in the Action List group box. Instead of selecting a customer, you can select the Detail button for one of these action rows and display the customer detail for the customer associated with the action.

Conversations

You can record any conversation you may have with the customer while working on the Collections Workbench by clicking a link in the header of the Collections Workbench to add a new conversation or by selecting the Conversations tab on the workbench to add, review, or delete conversations concerning the selected customer. Conversations enable a collector to track and act on conversations and promises made by the customer. Conversations and promises are discussed in more detail in a discussion about the Conversations tab and in the PeopleSoft Order to Cash Common Information documentation.

See Managing Customer Conversations and Promises.

See Entering and Reviewing Conversations.

Content Personalization

You can click the Personalize Content link in the header of the Collections Workbench and access the Personalize Content page, where you can determine if and how you want the Action List or Customer Details to appear on the Collections Workbench. You can also indicate if you want the message alert icon to appear next to the customer's name, which indicates that there are notes associated with the selected customer. These notes can be standard or custom and are printed on selected documents such as a bill of lading, a picking plan, an invoice, and more. They enable you to view what type of information has been sent to the customer, for example a reminder note, prior to your contacting them.

You can personalize the contents of the Customer Details group box by identifying the row and column where you want to add a specific field name in the group box after you select one of these field categories.

Activity Field

When you select this field category and place your cursor in a specific row and column, you can select from field names such as Broken Promises, Credits, Kept Promises, In Process Payments and more. When you select a field name, that selected field name appears in the row/column location of the Customer Details group box with a value next to it.

For example, a customer has 4 broken promises and you want to display the number of broken promises in the Customer Details group box on the Collections Workbench., If you select the Activity Field for the category, click the Search icon in Row 1, Column 1, and select the field name Broken Promises, when you return to the Collections Workbench page the field name Broken Promises will appear in Row 1, Column 1 in the Customer Details group box and the system displays 4.0 as the number of broken promises that exist for the selected customer.
Balances Field

This field works the same way as the Activity Field. However, the field names produced by the online search are different. Some of the fields names for the Balances Field category are Balances, Collections, Deductions, Deposits and more. The system will display the value associated with the selected field name in the selected column and row on the Customer Details group box.
General Field

This field also works the same way as the Activity Field. However, some of the field names that you can select are AR Specialist, Bill to Address, Collection Date, Collection Status and more.
Metric Field

This field also works the same way as the Activity Field. However, some of the field names that you can select are Prior History Day, Prior Avg Days Late, Prior Current Date, Prior DSO 30, Prior DSO 90 and more.
User Field

These are fields that you define specifically based on the needs of your organization. You can set up user-defined fields using instructions in the PeopleSoft Receivables and PeopleTools. documentation.

See PeopleTools: PeopleSoft Application Designer Developer's Guide.

This table is an example of Summary Information entered on the Personalize Content page. A Field Name and Category are selected for 3 columns and five rows.

Row/ Column	Column 1 Field Name (Category)	Column 2 Field Name (Category)	Column 3 Field Name (Category)
Row 1	AR Specialist (General)	Last Statement Date (Activity)	Balance (Balances)
Row 2	Collector (General)	Last Payment Date (Activity)	Collections (Balances)
Row 3	Contact Phone (General)	Last Payment Amount (Activity)	Past Due (Balances)
Row 4	Collection Status (General)	Broken Promises (Activity)	Deposits (Balances)
Row 5	Prior Avg Days Late (Metrics)

This diagram displays how the information entered on the previous example table appears in the Customer Details group box on the Collections Workbench page for selected customer 1001.

Image: Customer Details group box results based on the Personalize Content example

This example illustrates the fields and controls in the Customer Details group box on the Collections Workbench.

Collections Workbench - Customer Details group box results based Personalize Content example

You can also personalize the tabs that appear on the Collections Workbench page. You can rename the tabs and change the order of the tabs. The content of the data that appears on each tab is system-defined. The system-defined tab labels are:

Credit Profile
Items
Aging
Corporate Accounts
Payments
Conversations
Correspondence
Contracts

See General Information - Notes Page.

Action List

If you specify a customer ID in the Collections Workbench header, any action items associated with the user and the selected customer appear in the Action List group box, along with the details and workbench data applicable to the selected customer.

If you do not specify a customer ID and you click the Search button in the header of the Collections Workbench, the system displays all action items in the Action List group box of the Collections Workbench that are assigned to this user and have an action status of New. The list is initially sorted by customer name and priority. Once the user clicks the Detail button next to an action list item, the Collections Workbench header is refreshed with the customer ID and customer name associated with the action item along with any details and workbench data that apply to that customer. In addition, the system overrides any setid or customer entered in the Collections Workbench header and replaces it with the SetID and customer associated with the action list item.

You can also display a list action items by selecting a user-defined action filter. You can set up user-defined action filters by selecting the Action Filter link in the Action List group box to access the Filter Action List page. You select specific criteria on this page that are used to filter the owner action data. You assign a name to this filter, save it, and click the Search button. The system displays the action items in the Action List group box on the Collections Workbench page based on the filter criteria. You can set up, name, and save as many filters as you need for your organization. Whenever you access the Collections Workbench page, you can click the Search icon, select the appropriate action filter and display the action items that fall within the parameters of the selected action filter.

You can also reassign an action to another action owner by selecting the Reassign Action link on the Collections Workbench page.

See Assigning Actions and Sending Notification.

Customer Details

As previously discussed, you can personalize the customer details that you want to appear in Customer Details group box directly after the Action List on the Collections Workbench page by clicking the Personalize Content link and accessing the Personalize Content page. The values for the credit details that you select to appear on the Collections Workbench page are updated by the system based on the customer you select. You can also select an option on the Personalize Content page, which indicates that you do not want the Customer Details group box to appear at all on the Collections Workbench page.

Collections Workbench Detail Tabs

The Personalize Content page also enables you to change the system-defined tab labels and change the order of the tabs that appear on the Collections Workbench.

These are the system-defined tabs:

Credit Profile
Items
Aging
Corporate Accounts
Payments
Conversations
Correspondence
Contracts

The Contracts tab is available only if your business has implemented PeopleSoft Contracts. In addition, you can populate the Payments, Items, Aging, and Conversations tabs using contract-related criteria, whereas Credit Profile, Corporate Accounts, and Correspondence tabs return only customer-related data.

See .

Credit Profile Tab

The Credit Profile tab describes the current and past circumstances of the selected customer's credit. You can see everything that you need both about this customer's credit and any customer's within the selected customer's remit from, correspondence, and corporate hierarchy, depending on the multilevel hierarchies that have been set up for the selected customer. The Credit Profile tab for the selected customer contains:

The current and past due balances as of the current system date.
The credit limit amount
A risk score and risk level.
An assigned collector.
The credit class.
The D&B Rating (Dun & Bradstreet rating).
The fiscal year to date record of the number of open, kept, and broken promises.
A link to the Customer Messages page, which provides details or enables you to add details about a customer message.
History including all or various aspects of the history.
Aged date.
Posted date.

Customer Balances

You can click the customer's balance amount link to display the Items tab, which lists a breakdown of the total balance due based on each item purchased. You can also click the customer's past due amount link to display a detail list of the items that are past due that are included in this balance.

Risk Scoring

A risk score is calculated based on the set up and processing of specific risk scoring rules by the Risk Scoring program (RUN_AR_RISK). You can set up one or more risk scoring rules for selected setid, customer, or customer group. The range value entered in a risk score is used in conjunction with the risk scoring weight to compute the risk score. The system computes the Range Value * Risk Scoring Weight = Risk Score.

The Risk Scoring program is run as part of a nightly batch run after the ARUPDATE and AR_AGING processes have completed. This ensures that the most current risk score appears on the Credit Profile tab of the Collections Workbench and in the customer's Credit Profile. The AR_RISK program relies on updated history and aging information to compute the most accurate risk score. The Risk Score process does not take into account the Dun & Bradstreet rating for this customer.

The Risk Score condition enables the Condition Monitor to create action items based on a customer's risk score.

Risk score setup and processing are discussed in detail in other sections of the PeopleSoft Receivables and PeopleSoft Order to Cash Common Information documentation.

See Setting Up Risk Scoring Rules.

See Generating Risk Scores.

See Understanding Exception and Collection Processing Options.

Promise Tracking

Open, kept, and broken promises for this customer are based on the Promise Tracking functionality on the Conversations page. A summary of these promises are listed on the credit tab and a breakdown of these promise statuses appears on the Conversations tab, which is described in a later section.

Customer Messages

When you click a link to access the Customer Message page, you can review or update the message code, the start and end dates of the message, the action required, and the hold code, if applicable. You can also indicate whether you want Customer Messages to appear on the Collections Workbench.

See General Information - Messages Page.

Payments Tab

The Payments tab displays the outstanding and complete payment information for a customer and/or contract and the payment performance for a customer. If you select a SetID, customer, and business unit in the Collections Workbench header, the system will display this information for that specific business unit. If you leave the business unit blank, the system will display the totals on the Outstanding Payments, Complete Payments, and Payment Performance grids for all business units that apply to the selected customer.

With PeopleSoft Contracts integration, you can also search payments (credit items, payments, drafts, and direct debits) based on contract ID, contract line, contract type, billing specialist, billing authority, or reference award number, or a combination thereof, for the following:

On Account Items
Prepayments
Credit Memos
Outstanding Payments
Complete Payments

When you select the Payments tab, an On Account balance link enables you to access the Items tab and view any new On Account items for the selected criteria. You can also click the Prepayments total amount, which displays any items with prepayments that comprise this total.

You can set up one or more search filters to search for outstanding and complete payments. You select check boxes on the Payments tab to display payments in process, unapplied payments, drafts and direct debits in the Outstanding Payments grid. This grid displays the details for each payment and enables you to click the Deposit ID link to drill down to the Review Payments – All Payments page for regular payments, Draft Control page for drafts, and the Direct Debit Control page for direct debits.

You can use the search filter, select the Direct Debit and Draft check boxes, and enter a date range to display completed payments on the Complete Payments grid. This grid displays details about each completed payment. You can click a link to view the Item Activity From a Payment page, which displays how the completed payment affected each item.

The Payment Performance grid for customers displays the weighted average days and amount, which is the average number of days and amount it took to complete payments falling within a specified year and accounting period and an overall weighted average.

Depending on the level of customer that you select in the header (corporate, correspondence, or remit from) if a customer hierarchy is associated with this customer, then all outstanding payments for every customer that is at the same level or a lower level in the hierarchy appear in the Outstanding Payments list on the Payments tab.

See Customer History Calculations in the Receivables Update process.

Items Tab

The Items tab enables you to display an Item List associated with the selected customer based on the item status. You can also set up one or more filters to narrow your search for items similar to the way you set up filters for the Action List. The Item List is identical the Item List component (Accounts Receivable, Customer Accounts, Item Information, Item List). You can access the Account Overview component (Accounts Receivable, Customer Accounts, Customer Information, Account Overview) to view the selected customer's balance, the most recent item and payment activity, and summarized aging information. You can also click links to view detailed credit data, such as the customer's risk code or dispute status.

Once you select items on the Item List for the selected customer, you can select an item action, such as creating a maintenance worksheet, pay for an item by credit card, or generate a dunning letter. Once you select an item action, the system transfers you to the appropriate page to perform the action such as the Maintenance Worksheet and lists the items on that page.

Depending on the level of customer that you select in the header (corporate, correspondence, or remit from) if a customer hierarchy is associated with this customer, then the items purchased by the customer and all other customers defined at the same level or a lower level in the hierarchy appear in the Item List.

See Item List Page.

See Item Action Page.

Conversations Tab

The Conversations tab enables you to display a conversation's details related to the selected customer or contract values. You can search for specific conversations by creating a filter of selected attributes. You name and save each filter so that you can use it to search for those conversations again. When the details of a conversation appear on the Conversations grid, you can access the conversation by clicking the link associated with the conversation's date.

This tab also enables you to access the Conversations component to add a new conversation, as well as add any promise details on the Conversations page. You can access the Customer Contacts page from the Conversations tab and add a contact or click a link associated with a contact's name to modify a contact's information.

You can access the Promise Date Inquiry from the Conversations tab and search for promises by selecting various attributes. You indicate whether you want to show all of the promises based on your search criteria, or group the promises by customer, business unit, collector, or supervisor.

See Understanding Conversations.

See Setting Up Promise Date Options for a Customer.

See Reviewing Conversations and Promises.

Correspondence Tab

The Correspondence tab enables you to review any statements or dunning letters associated with this customer. You can drill down to the details for each form of correspondence. You can also view this customer's statements and send a statement as an attachment by e-mail.

Depending on the level of customer that you select in the header (corporate, correspondence, or remit from) if a customer hierarchy is associated with this customer, then any correspondence related to each of the customers appearing at each level of the hierarchy appear in the list of conversations on the Conversations tab.

Aging Tab

The Aging tab displays the customer current and past due balances, the high balance and high past due balance, and the balance and past due balance dates for the selected customer, as well as balances for any customer in the customer hierarchy. The current aged date appears and will be updated if you click an icon on this tab to update the aging. The Customer Aging grid contains the aging category, aging ID, the aging amount and currency, and the count.

See Understanding the Aging Application Engine Process.

See Setting Up Aging.

Customer Hierarchy Tab

When you select a customer to search for in the header of the Customer Workbench, you are required to select either corporate, correspondence, remit from, or no relationship as the customer relationship level. The selected relationship level determines the type of customer hierarchy that has been created for this customer and displays it on the Customer Hierarchy tab of the Customer Workbench. However, if the selected customer is not part of a customer hierarchy or you select the No Relationship value, then nothing will appear on the Customer Hierarchy tab.

The multilevel customer hierarchy that appears on the Customer Hierarchy tab is set up based on values that you select on General Info page (select Customers, then select Customer Information, then select General Information). The information that you select on the Customer General Info page for a customer displays in the customer hierarchy for the selected relationship on the Customer Hierarchy page (Accounts Receivable, Customer Accounts, Customer Information, Customer Hierarchy).

The level that you select in the header also accumulates the item and past due balances for each level of customer in the selected customer hierarchy and displays them on the Customer Hierarchy tab along with each customer's credit limit.

If the Customer Hierarchy tab displays a hierarchy with multiple levels of customers, then each of the tabs on the Collections Workbench is updated with data for each level of customer in the customer hierarchy, based on the selected customer level at the top of the Collections Workbench page.

See Corporate Customers.

See Reviewing Additional Customer Account Information.

See Installation Options - Customer Page.

Contracts Tab

The Contracts tab is available only if your PeopleSoft Financials installation integrates with PeopleSoft Contracts. You can retrieve Contracts data by entering contracts and/or customer information in the Collections Workbench header. This tab displays balances by contract and contract line, and you can select and review items by contract and contract line. In addition, a contracts filter enables you to narrow your search of selected attributes. For a given contract or contract line, the system returns multiple values for Billing Specialist and Billing Authority, which can be displayed including names and phone numbers, and for Projects, which shows Project Costing business unit, contracts project, and contracts activity.

You can also access the Contracts Console page for a selected contract to display a summary of contract lines, amounts, related projects, and milestones.