What is the best practice for Direct Credit payments matching?

Best Practice Guide for Payment Matching

For Employers which pay via EFT (Electronic Fund Transfer) as known as Direct Credit, the SuperChoice Clearinghouse matches received payment to Contribution submissions, and then pays the correct money to the recipient funds.

When the matching can be completed automatically, this enables prompt payment to the funds. When manually intervention is required, it can either result in delay or potential refund to the Employer.

Note

• Correct amount payment greatly helps with payment matching and prevents refunds or top-up payments being required.
• Employer’s which elect to make payment via Direct Debit will always auto-match correctly as SuperChoice will always automatically debit the correct amount.

The following best practice will help Employers to achieve automatic matching.

Usage of EmployerPay Portal auto-generated Payment Reference (PRN)

This is the optimal behaviour. When paying, please pay the correct amount and your bank payment reference should exactly match the 18 digit “PRN” auto-generated in the Portal on the payment summary.

What should I do if I can’t use the full 18 characters of the auto-generated PRN?

If you are constrained in the length of the payment reference, please pay the correct amount and use as much of the 18 digit “PRN” auto-generated in the Portal as the you can, ideally 13 characters or more is optimal.

What should I do if I can’t use the auto-generated PRN and must use my own unique Payment Reference?

If your existing internal payment process generates its own unique payment references or you are constrained from using the Portal auto-generated 18 digit “PRN”, please pay the correct amount, and:

If your own unique payment reference is known at the time of submission (e.g. If you pay prior to submission)

If your own unique payment reference is known at the time of the contribution submission, the 18 digit “PRN” auto-generated in the Portal should be replaced with your own unique payment reference.

If your own unique payment reference is unknown at the time of submission (e.g. some employers who pay after submission)

If your own unique payment reference is unknown at the time of the contribution submission, you do not have the option to edit the 18 digit “PRN” auto-generated post submission, hence the following are recommendations to improve automatic payment matching:

• Pay the correct amount
• If possible, set the refund bank account name registered in Employer Maintenance so that it matches the name of the bank account paying the submission
• If possible, set Employer name registered in Employer Maintenance so that it matches the name of the back account paying the submission
• Consider if payment prior to submission is possible, thus giving you the option to replace the 18 digit “PRN” auto-generated with your own unique payment reference.

What should I do if I can’t use the auto-generated PRN and must use my own static Payment Reference?

If you generate your own static payment reference with each payment, when it comes to the contribution submission, the 18 digit “PRN” auto-generated in the Portal should be replaced with your own static payment reference.

Static payment reference is 18 Characters

The EmployerPay Portal permits re-use of a static payment reference which is 18 characters in length.

Static payment reference is less than 18 Characters

The EmployerPay Portal will permit a static PRN of less than 18 characters for the first submission only. The Portal will mandate a unique PRN at the time of submission, so for each subsequent submission, you should enter your own static payment reference and then add additional character or characters at the end to make a unique PRN i.e. 1, 2, 3, or A, B, C, or DDMM.

What should I do if I submit a file that has more than one Employer?  

When submitting a file with more than one Employer in the file, the EmployerPay Portal supports both a single payment for all Employers, or individual payment per Employer. Before submission, please ensure that Employer Maintenance “split multi-employer batch” is correctly set for each of the Employers in the file before submission.

Other factors which can help auto matching:

• If the refund bank account name and / or Employer name registered in Employer Maintenance matches the name of the bank account paying the submission.
• If an Employer specific payment reference must be used, and the Employer forgets to replace the 18 digit “PRN” auto-generated in the Portal at the time of submission, then inclusion of the Employer’s ABN or Employer’s Name in the Employer specific payment reference will assist with matching.