Modify payment terms, methods, and advances

It can be difficult to manage outstanding payments. In the Turvo platform, the Payments Admin console helps keep payment settings organized by allowing you to tweak and adjust payment terms, methods, and advances that are available for third parties you do business with. You can also set up billing document rules for your tenant. Understanding this tool can be crucial to your business as rates and terms are constantly changing.

Finding the Payments Admin console

Once logged into Turvo, navigate to the Admin console in the upper right corner of the application:

In the Admin console select the Payments tile.

Configuring settings

The Admin console’s Payments page is broken into the Payments and Billing document rules sections. Each section covers different settings, which are explained below.

Payments

The Payments section is further broken down into three segments: 

• Methods 
• Terms 
• Advances 

Methods

The Methods segment allows you to define methods of payment your company accepts from its carrier partners. Note that this is a tenant-wide setting. The options will be reflected under the Details tab within the carrier's account. Use the left navigation menu to navigate to Accounts > Carriers to find a specific carrier, or search in the global search bar. 

Protip: We recommend defaulting all payment methods, giving options to it partners, proactively taking into account that all partners may not have the ability to pay via certain methods. 

• Methods: Available payment options: ACH, COMCHECK, EFS, Paper check, and Wire. 
  
  • ACH Payment: Electronic payment deducted from customer's account. 
  • COMCHECK: A form of payment that is used to pay an unload fee to the lumpers services and also used to purchase Fuel/Equipment at the fuel station.
  • EFS (Electronic Funds Source): Instantly issue payment or cash. Ideal for brokers as they provide immediate payment or access to cash to keep fleets moving forward.
  • Paper check: Any type of paper check. 
  • Wire: Transfer payment electronically to end user. 

Note: At this time, Turvo does not support sending payments directly through the Turvo platform. Configuring payment methods here is for record keeping purposes.

• Fee type: Available options below. Note each option has a different effect on the payment term, defined below.
  • Flat ($X), % of payment: Implies a flat fee for that payment term.
  • % of gross costs: Implies a percentage fee for the payment term.
  • Step ($X per $Y payment): Implies a step fee of X for every Y amount paid. 
  • No fee: No fee accessed on payment. 
• Default for New Carriers: Check this box if you would like the corresponding payment method to be the default for new carriers.

Terms

Important note: The ability to edit terms in the Admin Console has been temporarily disabled. Submit a ticket with our Support team if you need these updated.

The Terms segment allows you to define the payment terms that will be reflected in the carrier details. Setting terms ensures you hold your partners accountable.

• Term: Define payment term name.
• Days to pay: Define payment due date (in days) for each payment type. 
• Fee type: Available options below. Note each option has a different effect on the payment term, defined below.
  • Flat ($X), % of payment: Implies a flat fee for that payment term.
  • % of gross costs: Implies a percentage fee for the payment term.
  • Step ($X per $Y payment): implies a step fee of X for every Y amount paid. 
  • No fee: no fee accessed on payment. 
• Deduct from (required): Select one of the below.
  
  • Payment: Pays the driver the net amount, minus the fee you are collecting. For example, if you configure a flat fee of $25 to be deducted from payments and you issue a $150 payment, the driver will receive $125.
  • Balance: Pays the driver the gross amount, and deducts the fee from the remaining balance that is owed to the carrier as a separate line item. For example, if you configure a flat fee of $25 to be deducted from the balance and you issue a payment of $150 on a shipment with a balance of $400, the driver will receive the full $150 and the fee will be deducted from the $400, leaving a balance of $375.
• Waive processing fee: This option waives the EFS, ACH, and/or COMCHECK transaction fee.
• Methods (required): Shows the methods you defined in the previous section. Choose the payment method that corresponds to this term. 
• Default for New Carriers: Check this box if you would like the corresponding payment method to be the default for new carriers.

Advances

The Advances segment allows you to define Payment Advances that are relevant to your business. This is any payment issued for a shipment prior to the completion of the work. Drivers often request advances to cover the cost of fuel so they can run the shipment, oftentimes issued via COMCHECK.

• Term: Define the payment advance name.
• Fee type: Available options below. Note each option has a different affect on the payment term, defined below.
  • Flat ($X), % of payment: Implies a flat fee for that payment term.
  • % of gross costs: Implies a percentage fee for the payment term.
  • Step ($X per $Y payment): implies a step fee of X for every Y amount paid. 
  • No fee: no fee accessed on payment. 
• Deduct from (required): Select one of the below.
  • Payment: Pays the driver the net amount, minus the fee you are collecting. For example, if you configure a flat fee of $25 to be deducted from payments and you issue a $150 advance, the driver will receive $125.
  • Balance: Pays the driver the gross amount, and deducts the fee from the remaining balance that is owed to the carrier as a separate line item. For example, if you configure a $25 flat fee to be deducted from the balance and you issue a $150 advance on a shipment with a $400 carrier rate balance, the driver will receive the full $150 advance, and the balance will change to $375.
• Waive processing fee: This is the option to waive the EFS and/or COMCHECK transaction fee.
• Methods (required): Shows the methods you defined in the previous section. Choose the payment method that corresponds to this term.
• Default for New Carriers: Check this box if you would like the corresponding payment method to be the default for new carriers.

Advances has an additional section allowing you define additional details related to the advances. Please note that these are treated as independent limits and if one is met, then the advance is restricted:

• Advance % limit: The maximum limit you want to put on an advance, in %terms.
• Advance amt limit: The maximum limit you want to put on an advance, in $terms.
• Dispatchers permitted (default): When selected, this implies that all enabled advances are permitted for all dispatchers.
• Drivers permitted (default): When selected, this implies that all enabled advances are permitted for all drivers. 

Billing document rules

The Billing document rules segment gives you options to enable rules for your tenant’s billing documents. Options include:

• Automatically append required documents to Customer Invoice: If this toggle is switched on, required documents will be automatically attached to the customer invoice email.
• Automatically advance status from Route Complete to Ready for Billing: If this toggle is switched on, all shipments will be automatically updated from the Route Complete status to the Ready for Billing status if all required documents have been uploaded and the #HasDocs tag attached to the shipment.
  • Note: If your tenant uses order-based customer invoicing, all shipments associated with an order must be moved to Ready for Billing before the invoice can be generated for the order.
• Billing tags and billing status based on documents uploaded: Use the drop-down to select the document types that are required for invoicing this customer. 
  • All document types in Turvo are available, as well as the BOL or POD option, which will make either the Bill of Lading (BOL) or Proof of Delivery (POD) required for all shipments, and the None option, which removes all document requirements.
    • Note: Selecting the BOL or POD options individually would mean that all shipments require a BOL or a POD specifically. Using the BOL or POD means that one or the other is required.
  • Select all additional documents that apply, or use the x next to a selected document type’s name to remove it from the requirements.
  • Protip: See our article on Configuring required document rules for customer invoicing to learn more about setting up document requirements for customer invoices here and at the customer level.