Bulk collection
Collecting several overdue installments of a loan in one operation, instead of one by one.
The client vanished for three months and today shows up to pay everything. Instead of recording three collections in a row, use Bulk collection from the loan detail: pay several installments at once, in a single operation.
Like every collection, it requires an open cash drawer.
How it works
The form is a list of rows. In each row you only state two things:
Field | What you type |
|---|---|
Installment no. | Which installment you are paying |
Arrears | The arrears for that installment (optional; blank = 0) |
You do not type amounts. The principal and interest of each installment are derived by the system from the loan schedule: you cannot inject different figures. That is deliberate: in a mass collection, typing amounts by hand is the fastest route to a mismatch.
You can add up to 120 installments in one batch.
A worked example
A loan with an installment of RD$5,000 (principal 4,200 + interest 800). The client owes installments 3, 4 and 5, and you decide to charge 350, 200 and 50 of arrears respectively, figures you type into each row.
Installment | Installment (from schedule) | Arrears | Collected |
|---|---|---|---|
3 | 5,000 | 350 | 5,350 |
4 | 5,000 | 200 | 5,200 |
5 | 5,000 | 50 | 5,050 |
Total | 15,000 | 600 | RD$15,600 |
On save:
- The drawer is credited RD$15,600: installments plus arrears (collected arrears are cash received).
- The loan adds 3 paid installments, +15,600 to total paid and +3,000 of profit (2,400 interest + 600 arrears).
- The next payment date jumps to the first installment still unpaid in the schedule: not simply "the next one", if you left a gap, the system spots it and points there.
- The drawer records a single incoming movement for the 15,600; accounting records one entry per installment (so each payment stays individually traceable).
All or nothing
The batch is one single transaction: if one row fails, none is recorded. There is no "2 out of 3 collected".
Errors that abort the whole batch:
Message | Cause |
|---|---|
Duplicate installment number in the batch | You listed the same installment twice |
Installment N was already settled | That installment is already paid |
Installment outside the schedule | The number does not exist on this loan |
The loan is already settled / was renewed | The loan takes no payments |
There is no open cash session | The drawer is closed |
The loan changed state during the operation | Another collector touched the loan while you were filling the form |
When the loan ends up settled
Bulk takes no payoff: you cannot pay off the outstanding principal of future installments ahead of schedule. That is what Settling a loan is for.
But careful, that does not mean bulk never settles the loan:
If the installments you put in the batch are the ones that were missing, the loan ends up settled, exactly as if you had made the last normal collection.
Example: a 12-installment loan with 9 paid. You add installments 10, 11 and 12 to a batch and on save the loan turns Settled, frees its seat in your plan's quota and drops out of the active portfolio.
The difference with a payoff is what you collect, not the outcome: bulk collects full installments (principal + interest of each one, per the schedule); a payoff settles only the outstanding principal, with no future interest.
What bulk does NOT do
- It takes no payoff. It does not settle principal ahead of schedule: it collects full installments from the schedule.
- It takes no partial payments. Each row pays the full installment. If the client brings less, use the normal collection with a partial (Recording a payment).
- It does not extend open-interest loans.
- It does not compute arrears for you: every row's arrears field comes in blank and whatever you type there is what gets collected (empty = zero arrears). Check the arrears in the arrears screen or the loan detail before filling the batch. See How arrears are calculated.
Permission
Bulk uses a different permission from normal collection: record bulk payments. You can let a collector charge installment by installment without letting them process batches.