Marking a Recurring Payment as Paid by Hand

Sometimes a parent pays a term or a month directly — cash at the hall, a cheque, or a bank transfer — instead of waiting for the Direct Debit to collect it. When that happens you can record it against the right subscription payment by hand. Doing so books the money to your accounts, makes sure the Direct Debit doesn't also collect that same payment, and leaves the rest of the schedule running as normal. There's nothing to set up — and you can undo it if you mark the wrong one.

When this is useful#

• A parent hands you cash for this term before their Direct Debit is even set up.
• A parent pays one payment by cheque or bank transfer and asks you not to take it by Direct Debit.
• You want a single payment settled by hand without pausing the whole subscription.

If you want to stop several payments rather than record one as paid, use Pausing a Member's Subscription instead.

Where to find it#

Go to Finance → Online Payments and open the Recurring Payments tab. There are two places you can mark a payment as paid by hand.

From the payments grid. Each subscription plan expands to show a row per member, with a column of payments across the months. Click a payment that's still due — a past one that was never collected, one that didn't go through, or the next one coming up — and choose Mark as paid manually from the popup.

From a member's payment history. Open a member's payment history from their finance record. On the next payment due, you'll see a Mark as paid button.

Recording the payment#

Either route opens a small Mark cycle as paid box. Fill in three things:

Confirm, and the payment is recorded straight away.

What happens next#

Once you've marked a payment as paid by hand:

• The money is booked to your accounts. It appears as income in your finance reports and on the bank balance, just like a collected Direct Debit payment — so your books stay accurate.
• The Direct Debit won't collect that payment. If a collection for that payment was already lined up, it's stopped. The parent is never charged twice for the same payment.
• The rest of the schedule keeps running. The subscription continues collecting on its normal dates from the next payment onwards. Marking one payment by hand doesn't pause the subscription, and it won't show as paused anywhere.
• Catch-up leaves it alone. Because the payment is now recorded as paid, the system that chases missed payments won't try to collect it again.

Telling a hand-marked payment apart#

In the payments grid, a payment you've settled by hand still shows as paid and green — but the tick is replaced with a small cash marker, so you can tell at a glance how it was settled. Click the payment to see the details: it reads Marked paid manually with the date, rather than Collected.

If you download the receipt for a hand-marked payment, it's stamped PAID (Manual) and shows how it was paid.

Undoing a hand-marked payment#

Made a mistake, or the cheque bounced? Open the member's payment history, find the payment you marked by hand, and choose Undo manual payment.

This removes the recorded payment and reverses the matching entry in your accounts. If marking it by hand had skipped an upcoming Direct Debit collection, undoing it lets the subscription resume as normal — though the skipped collection won't be recreated automatically, so check whether you still need to collect that payment another way.

Good to know#

• You can only mark a payment by hand if it's still outstanding — a past payment that was missed, one that didn't go through, or the next one due. You can't mark a payment that's already been collected, or one that's too far in the future.
• Once a payment has been sent to the bank for collection, it's too late to mark it by hand. If it goes through and you need to give the money back, use a refund instead.
• For payments far ahead in the schedule, use Pausing a Member's Subscription to skip them rather than marking each one by hand.

What's next#

• Collecting Subscriptions from Parents — setting up the recurring payments this applies to.
• Pausing a Member's Subscription — stop several payments at once instead of recording one.
• Refunds — give money back when a payment has already been collected.