The Find/Refresh Button Line - These fields are used when you have a long list of companies and you wish to search for a specific company. The Code field accepts up to 12 characters and the Name field accepts up to 40 characters.

The Company Selection List - This select box contains the ACH companies that have been defined for your company. Each line in the list displays the Code and Name of a single company.

Batch Selection
Batch Selection consists of two sections,the Select Fields/Find Button line and the Batch Selection List.

The Find/Refresh Button Line - These fields are used when you have a long list of batches and you wish to search for a specific batch. The Code field accepts up to 10 characters and the Name field accepts up to 40 characters. Click the Find/Refresh button.

The Batch Selection List - This select box contains the batches that have been defined via the Batch Maintenance service. Each line in the list displays the Code and Name of a single batch established for the selected company. From this list, select the batch you wish to activate.

Batch Activation Area
After you have specified the batch to activate, you are in the Batch Activation Area. This area is located at the bottom of the screen and contains fields of information in the batch.

Prior to activating the batch, you must specify the Effective Entry Date for this batch. This is the date the batch's transactions will be settled at the receiving bank. The date must be entered in MM/DD/YYYY format.

The Descriptive Date is optional and to be used for your internal reference. This field is to be filled prior to activation.

The Batch Activation Area Buttons

• Activate Batch - Click this button to submit this batch for approval. Once you have clicked on the Activate Batch button, a confirmation page displays.
  
• Update Entries - Click this button to update amounts and addenda for individual transactions within the batch.
  
• Reset - Click this button to return the existing batch's effective entry date and descriptive date to the original values.

Freezing One or More Batch Entries - If you wish to exclude one or more entries from the batch, you may freeze the entry prior to batch activation. Entries that have been frozen are not included in the batch when it is activated. To freeze one or more entries, simply place a check mark in the Frozen check box.

Once you have finished updating, click the Submit Changes & Activate Batch button. You will be presented with a Confirmation Page, discussed in the next section.

 
Confirmation
The Confirmation displays the details about the activated batch. You can print this page and use it for future reference. The information displayed includes:

• Your Name
• Your Company's Name
• Your Address
• The ACH Company ID and Name
• The Total Debit and/or Credit Amount
• The Total Number of Debits and/or Credits
• The Total Number of Detail Records (entries) in the batch
• The Date on which the batch was Accepted (activated)
• The Effective Entry Date of the batch
• The ACH Batch Template ID used to create this batch
• The Customer/User who activated the batch
• The Date/Time the batch was activated
• A Customer Trace consisting of a four digit number that increments each time a new batch is activated for any ACH Company assigned to your company. The Customer Trace number begins at 0001.
• Legal information
• An e-mail link to Customer Service, in case you have questions

Once you have received this confirmation message, the batch is ready for approval by an authorized user. At this point, you may leave this service by clicking on another Service Group and then another Service.

ACH Approval

ACH Approval Service is a security feature that allows you to approve an ACH batch before it is sent to The Exchange Bank. All ACH batches must be approved by an authorized user before they can be sent to the Bank. You may not approve a batch if you (your user code) activated the batch via the ACH Activation service.
Approving a batch consists of reviewing the batch information on the Pending Batches list, then selecting the approve button. After selecting the batch to approve, an approval screen appears. On the approval screen, you have the option to approve or skip/unlock.

Once the batch has been approved, you will receive a confirmation message acknowledging the approval and the release of the batch to the Bank. Also provided is a reference number that you can use in tracking.

Pending Batches Review
This screen displays all of the batches pending approval that you may approve. Only those batches for which you have permission (to approve) will appear on this list. Pending batches are displayed in order of effective date. Summary information for each pending batch is provided on a single line.

The Pending Transfers Review Page Buttons

• Approve - Click this button to approve the batch for release to the Bank. Once you have clicked on the Approve button, you will be presented with the Approval Page, discussed in the next section.
• Delete - Click this button to delete the activated batch from the system. Once you have clicked on the Delete button, you will be presented with the Approval Page, but it will have a Delete button, rather than an Approve button. Once a batch has been deleted from the system, it will not be seen by the Bank.

Once you have clicked on either the Approve or Delete buttons, the batch is locked under your user ID. By locking the batch under your User ID, the system prevents another user from approving or deleting this batch at the same time.

Approval
This screen is presented after the approve button is selected from the Pending Transfers Page. Details of the batch are displayed for a final review. The company name and batch name associated with the batch are listed along with the batch description. Other details include, text entered in the Company Discretionary Data field, along with the Effective Entry Date and Descriptive Date.

Effective Entry Date versus Descriptive Date

• Effective Entry Date - This is the date on which the transactions will be settled at the receiving bank.
• Descriptive Date - This is the date that you wish to display to the participant or receiver of the batch and file. This date is optional and is entered when the batch is activated.

The Approval Page Buttons

• Approve - Click this button to approve the batch for release to the Bank. Once you have approved the batch, you are presented with a Confirmation Page.
• Skip/Unlock - If you decide not to approve the displayed batch, click the skip/unlock button to release the batch. If you choose to Skip, the batch remains on the system with a pending status and is still not seen by the Bank.

• Your Name
• Your Company's Name
• Your Address
• The ACH Company Name associated with this batch
• The Total Debit Amount of this batch
• The total number of debits in this batch
• The total number of detail records in this batch
• The Customer/User who activated the batch into the system
• The Customer/User who approved the batch for release to the Bank
• A system response, showing the date your batch was accepted in the system
• The Effective Entry Date indicating the date the transactions will be settled at the receiving bank
• The ACH Batch Template associated with this batch
• The Total Credit Amount of this batch
• The total number of credits in this batch
• The Credit Bank to which you are sending money
• The Activation Date/Time that the batch was activated in the system
• The Approval Date/Time that the batch was approved
• A sequential company-wide reference number
• A system-wide reference number consisting of Julian Date and unique sequence number
• Legal information
• A blue underlined e-mail link to Customer Service, in case you have questions

Once you have received this confirmation message, you can be assured that the Bank has or will receive your batch to process. At this point, you may select the Continue button to acknowledge the confirmation. Next, you may select another service within this system, or Logout of the system.

ACH Reversals

ACH Reports

• Batches - This selection list contains all of the batches available to you. From this list, you may choose one or many batches. The default for this selection is "All Batches". ACH activity for the selected batches will display on the report.
• Date Query - The Query selection represents the processing date or the effective entry date. The date fields default to the current date, however for reporting purposes, you may display information for any date range as far back as 7 business days and for up to 30 days in the future. This is the date of the information you wish to display. The system will automatically show the current day, but you may enter a specific date or range of dates. The small blue icon to the right of each date field is a calendar which can be used as a visual aid in selecting your date(s). The date must be entered in month, day, year format using the numeric values of the month, such as 01 for January and 12 for December. You may enter the year as four digits or two, even after 1999. The dates you enter are inclusive and if ACH transactions exist for these dates, they will be displayed.
• Sort - This determines how information is sorted in the report. You may choose among "by bank trace number", "by customer trace number", "by company Id", and "by effective entry date".
• Bank Trace Number - This is the confirmation number that was assigned to the batch when it was activated. The bank trace number is made up of a Julian Day number, followed by a sequential number which represents the individual batch. For example, a bank trace number of 320010 would represent the 10th batch activated for processing date February 1. This number is unique across the Bank.
• Customer Trace Number - This is the confirmation number assignment used for batches initiated by your company. It is a sequential number between 1 and 9999. It is not tied to any particular date or year, but is intended to help you track the batches entered by you and your co-workers. This number is unique within your company for the ACH Service. Other transaction initiation services use their own customer trace number.
• State - This selection allows you to limit the display to those batches which are in a particular "state" of processing. The default for the ACH Report is all states. You may select another state such as "Activated", "Approved", "Processed", or "Locked".

  The Data Selection Page Buttons

  • Submit - After you have selected the desired filters, selecting this button will generate the requested report, which will be displayed as a new page in your browser work area.
  • Clear - This will reset all filter fields to their original values. This button will display the Data Selection Preferences Page, discussed in the next section.
    

• Type - Summary or Detail. Summary will provide only a description of the item and an amount. Detail will provide all reported information for all filtered items.
• Style - Table or Raw. A Table report is a presentation-quality report. The Raw report resembles a dot matrix printer report, which may be more familiar to some users.
• Sort - This determines how information is sorted in the report.
• Totals - This determines whether the balance and summary total items for all accounts displayed are added together and displayed. These totals are useful for getting a fast view of your overall position. You may select among displaying no totals, only totals or show totals combined with the individual items.

The Preferences Page Buttons

• Set Preferences - After you have defined the desired preferences, selecting this button will save your selections. They will be used the next time you request a report.
• Reset - This resets the filter fields to their original values.

ACH Report
Report displays the ACH batches specified through the Data Selection. You may print the report to save it for future reference. It consists of two sections, the header and data area.

The report header contains:

• Your company's name
• The name of the report, ACH Report
• The date and time you displayed the report
• The File Trace Number
• The date and time the batch was created
• The name of the Customer to whom this batch belongs
• The File Size

The data area of the report is divided by Bank trace number, unless you specified Customer trace number, company Id, or effective entry date in the Sort selection list. Within each Bank trace number section the transfers are sorted by trace number/processing date unless you specified amount, settlement date, or customer reference.

The batch summary consists of:

• Bank Number
• Company Name and associated Company ID
• Batch Name
• Transaction Type
• Total Debit Amount
• Total Credit Amount
• Number of Entries
• Effective Entry Date, the date on which the recipient of the batch will/did post the transactions

Effective Entry Date - This is the date that the receiving bank will settle the batch transactions.

ACH Totals

File Totals Notification
Customer Name (40):
Contact Person (40):
Contact Phone (25):
Total Debit Amount (11):
Total Credit Amount (11):