Defining Collections Actions

About Defining Collections Actions

Collections actions are individual steps that are performed in the process of collecting overdue balances. An action might be applying a late fee or making a phone call.

You can define as many actions as you need. For example, you can define different phone call actions for different situations: courtesy calls, warning calls, and so on. The same action can be included in multiple scenarios.

When you define a collections action, you specify the following in Collections Configuration:

The collections action name
The action type: manual, one of several system types, or custom
For bill units in a collections group, the target bill units: the specified bill unit only (Self), the parent and all child bill units (All Members and Parent), or all child bill units (All Members)

Note:

The action target defined for each of the actions for a customer is the same for all scenarios. When the action target mode is set for an action, the action target cannot be changed for any newly defined scenarios.

Understanding Manual Actions

Manual actions are completed by collections agents. When a scenario calls for a manual action, BRM saves information about the action in the database. Billing Care displays this information so that a collections agent can complete the action.

For example, suppose that a scenario calls for the customer to receive a courtesy phone call when the account's bill unit is 10 days into the collections process. When a bill unit enters collections, this phone call is included in the list of actions for the bill unit. On the day when the phone call is due, the phone call appears in the list of tasks for the collections agent assigned to the bill unit.

The most common manual action is a phone call, but you can create any others that your business requires.

Understanding System Actions

System actions are performed automatically by BRM when either of the following two utilities is run:

pin_collections_process
pin_deferred_act (as a part of the pin_bill_day script)

If an error occurs during any collections action performed when pin_collections_process is run, the status of the collections action object (/collections_action) and the schedule object (/schedule) corresponding to the collections action is updated to Error.

If an error occurs during any collections action performed when pin_deferred_act is run, the status of the collections action remains Pending but the schedule object corresponding to the collections action is updated to Error. When pin_collections_process is run and the collections actions is processed again, if an error occurs, then the collections action object is updated to Error.

The status of collections actions is updated to Completed on successful completion of the actions.

By default, Collections Manager supports the following types of system collections actions:

Charging a late fee. For late fees, you specify the currency type, such as US dollars, and the late fee type, either a specified amount or a percentage of the overdue amount.
Adding a finance charge. For finance charges, you specify to charge a certain percentage of the overdue amount.
Sending a dunning letter. For dunning letters, you specify the dunning letter template to use. You can have different templates for different purposes. For example, you could define several dunning letter templates with varying levels of severity. These templates could be used at different times in the same scenario or in separate scenarios.
Sending an invoice reminder. For invoice reminders, you specify the invoice reminder template to use. You can have different templates for different purposes. For example, you could define several invoice reminder templates with varying levels of severity. These templates could be used at different times in the same scenario or in separate scenarios.

You can customize each system action's behavior by modifying policy opcodes. See the chapter on collections opcode workflows in BRM Opcode Guide for information.

Performing Scheduled Collections Actions after Reinstalling Collections Manager

By default, if you run the pin_collections_process utility after reinstalling Collections Manager, the scheduled collections actions that have a due date prior to the date on which you reinstalled Collections Manager are not performed.

To perform all scheduled collections actions irrespective of whether they have a due date prior to the date or after the date on which you reinstalled Collections Manager and ran pin_collections_process:

Open the CM configuration file (BRM_home/sys/cm/pin.conf) in a text editor.
Add the following entry:
```
-  fm_collections execute_all_actions value
```
where value is:
- 1 to perform all collections actions irrespective of whether they have a due date prior to the date or after the date on which you run pin_collections_process after reinstalling Collections Manager.
- 0 to perform only those collections actions that have a due date later than the date on which pin_collections_process is run after reinstalling Collections Manager. This is the default.
Save and close the file.
Stop and restart the CM.

Understanding Custom Actions

Custom actions are system actions that you create. You define custom actions and descriptions in Collections Configuration and implement the actions by modifying the PCM_OP_COLLECTIONS_POL_EXEC_POLICY_ACTION policy opcode.

Increasing the Size of the CM Cache for Actions Data

When defining actions, you might need to increase the space allocated to the action data in the CM cache.

To increase the CM cache size for actions data:

Open the CM configuration file (BRM_home/sys/cm/pin.conf).
Increase cache_size in the following entry:
```
- cm_cache fm_collections_config_actions_cache number_of_entries, cache_size, hash_size
```
Note:
The default is 40960 bytes.
Save the file.
Stop and restart the CM.