The FRB produces six sets of files each business day on weekdays, Monday through Friday, except for Federal Holidays. CU*Answers posts the files as follows: CU*Answers receives the first and sixth set of files overnight and posts them by 8:30 AM ET. As this posting is a combined posting, two Receive reports and one Posting report are produced. CU*Answers receives the second set of files by noon and posts by 1:00 PM ET. Same-day credits must be posted with this file. CU*Answers receives the thir  More...

If the credit union accidently returns an item, the following steps should be taken: 1) Launch Tool #1875 Work ACH Exceptions or Tool #1876 Work ACH NSF/Returns . 2) Click on the Return/NOC Maint button (or Return Maintenance). 3) Find/highlight the ACH Item you wish to delete and select Change . (NOTE: you won't be able to do this if the item has already been processed) 4) Select the Delete button 5) Once the item is deleted, someone from your accounting team MUST make an entry to   More...

If an item is originated by the credit union, the items CANNOT be returned using a return code. Instead, your credit union can Call the other financial institution to have them reject the debit so it will send back the item to the originating credit union, OR Your credit union can do another ACH Origination and reverse the FI information to send the credit or debit back.

No, CU*BASE cannot automatically remove the 08 Payment Stopped code from an ACH distribution record. ACH stop payments are tricky. Since an ACH stop payment is only valid for a specific payment, the system would have no way to determine which payment it was applicable for as it’s not easily identified by simply using the posting date. Often the information needed is located in other optional fields of the ACH record such as company descriptive date. For instance, if a member is NSF for  More...

Prior to the 16.10 release, the SSA began using multiple Company IDs, and it was recommended that credit unions consider using Automated Funds Transfers (AFTs) to handle distributions. Beginning the 16.10 release a new cross-reference system will be implemented that will automatically funnel all incoming company IDs from the Social Security Administration and treat them as if they came from one, consistent company ID we’re referring to as the “Primary ID.” With the changes ma  More...

With the 16.10 release a new cross-reference system was implemented that automatically funnels all incoming company IDs from the Social Security Administration and treat them as if they came from one, consistent company ID we’re referring to as the “Primary ID.” In cases where the Depositor ID is the same, for example a husband and wife, these ACH transactions will be handled by the same master ACH distribution record under the Depositor ID since duplicate Depositor IDs are no  More...

Xtend SRS Bookkeeping has a policy of using a period in the account number box so the return can be sent and the Fed will not reject the return.

No. CU*BASE accounts payable payments made via ACH do not pay any attention to any limits entered in CU*BASE via Tool #569: Online/Mobile/Text Banking VMS Config > A2A Transfers . However, all ACH transactions that we send to Magic-Wrighter on your behalf, whether for a member or via the accounts payable system, are considered part of the same pool of transactions to which Magic-Wrighter's daily limits DO apply. Therefore, if your credit union gets a failure-to-process error on a large  More...

OFAC is defined in the NACHA Operating Rules and Guidelines Chapter 3, Section 1 pages OG15-OG21. There is a difference between OFAC procedures for ACH transactions and the verification of parties with which a financial institution does business. For ACH purposes, only the addenda information on cross border transactions (IATs) require an OFAC scan for both RDFIs (receiving depository financial institutions) and ODFIs (outgoing depository financial institutions). As far as OFAC compliance goes  More...

This happens when there is an invalid ACH item that can't be posted at all (bad account number, for example). Even if you subsequently update it, when reposting if the item can't pay due to non-sufficient funds, the NSF fee will not automatically be charged. The ACH item will also not show in the member's transaction history. That's because NSF fees are only charged when the item originally comes in, not via the ACH Exceptions re-post feature, to prevent these fees from being   More...

You can manually add a secondary transaction description to any posted transaction by using Tool #918 Update Trans Desc IRA/HSA Post Codes. Just enter the account number, select the transaction you posted, and click the Description/Stmt option to enter in a secondary transaction description as it came in on the original ACH item. (Make sure you do this before that month's statements are produced, of course!)

The pending transaction can be found by printing the warehoused ACH transactions (Tool # 693 Print Warehoused ACH Transactions ). In this case there was a pending withdrawal for the member's 000 account. It can be found on the PACHSU report as an invalid account. However, the program for pending transactions only uses the company ID and the Depositor Id to look up an entry in the ACHSUS and ACHDST file. So that was enough information to see the P for Pending without actually being able to   More...

Remember that Fiservoffers their CheckFree service direct to consumers and via many other financial institutions throughout the country, including banks and other, non-CU*BASE credit unions. The CheckFree Direct product is called mycheckfree and members may sign up for this themselves from many different sources on the Internet. (It's not at all uncommon for people to sign up and never use the service!) Just because the money comes from their credit union accounts doesn't mean they   More...

Using a link to the standard login pages provides much more than just the ability to log in: The I forgot my password link that allows them to reset their password online They have to set up the Security Questions anyway; why not give them a place to use them to help themselves if they forget their password? The Apply for Membership link to capture membership applications and work them right from CU*BASE (no rekeying!) Why would you not allow every possible opportunity for someone to say th  More...

There are mandatory fields which need to be filled out differently for dishonored returns. Make sure to have the original item information as well as the dishonored return item information as this will help to speed up the process. You may need to add this manually and choose the appropriate code for your reason. CU*Answers cannot advise which code to use or the ACH rules that surrounds each item. If you need further guidance, please feel free to reach out to the FRB directly. The ACH return   More...

The most important thing to understand is when the bill will be received, not how it will be paid. Payment methods are determined by the relationship between Fiserv and the biller, and are subject to change. When scheduling a payment, the system automatically pre-fills the earliest payment date the biller can receive the payment. The date can be altered to a future date, but not an earlier date. Once a payment begins processing, you will be able to view the payment method in the history. If the   More...

For online credit unions, contact a Client Service Representative or complete the It's Me 247 Configuration Change Request Form (see the link below; requires Microsoft Word) to activate this flag. For self processors, this is done using OPER Tool #5356 Online Banking Configuration and OPER Tool #5511 Audio Response Configuration . IMPORTANT: If you have already activated PIB and your members have a PIB profile, remember that the ability to view ACH records is controlled by the member&#  More...

It is NOT suggested that a CU place a stop or a reversal on a Fiserv ACH debit. If a Credit Union places a stop on a Fiserv ACH debit or a reversal of a Fiserv ACH debit, the following will occur: --The member’s bill pay service will be frozen. --No pending or recurring payments will be sent from the member’s bill pay. --The amount of the stopped/reversed payment will become a collection item with the Fiserv Collections Department. --The member will need to personally call the Fiser  More...

When it comes to ACH originators who change company IDs, we provide our credit unions with a daily report that highlights any new company IDs that are present. This is the NEW ACH COMPANIES AND INDIVIDUAL ACCOUNTS (PACHD3) report. It is available for you to review in CU*Spy each day for any prior day's activity and present within your DAILYxx output queue for you to review for current day activity (each day all reports are generated to the DAILYxx OUTQ and then routed to CU*Spy for archiva  More...

The Social Security Administration uses several company IDs for its ACH transactions. Previously two recommendations were made to handle the changing Company IDs, namely to create records for all possible Company IDs with duplicate distribution records or to transfer the distributions with the Automated Funds Transfers (AFT) system. With the 16.10 release a process was implemented that will no longer require either of these complicated solutions. Going forward only one Company ID will need to   More...

Yes, but they won't post. Only base deposits will post on any incoming ACH items for this company. This should be done only in special situations where distributions are not desired, such as a special bonus payroll. In this case, the flag would be unchecked just before the bonus payroll is received, then checked again after the payroll was posted to ensure that future items would post with distributions as normal.

Beginning March 16, 2018, NACHA requires that same-day items are posted by 5 PM local time the same day they are received. When the NCUA indicates “by” 5:00 PM, this means ‘anytime’ before 5:00 PM That means 6:00 PM AT, 5:00 PM ET, 4:00 PM CT, 3:00 PM MT, and 2:00 PM PT, all of which are by 5:00 PM local time, are acceptable. Effective March 16, 2018, the in the afternoon posting (which must include credits) was moved to 4 PM ET.

The following things are not affected by 7-day back office processing changes implemeted in February 2019. ACH - ACH will continue to process as always. OTB - OTB is not affected by 7-day back office processing. RDC - Deposits are processed seven days a week or by credit union configuration. eAlerts - These are sent with an automated process that is not changed with 7-day back office processing.

Prior to the 16.10 release, the SSA began using multiple Company IDs, and it was recommended that credit unions consider using Automated Funds Transfers (AFTs) to handle distributions. Beginning with the 16.10 release a new cross-reference system will be implemented that will automatically funnel all incoming company IDs from the Social Security Administration and treat them as if they came from one, consistent company ID we’re referring to as the “Primary ID.” With the chang  More...

Not every feature that potentially shows account details on an employee's account is governed by the Employee Account Security controls. Apart from technical impracticalities, our basic philosophy has been that employees who are given access to “sensitive” features (like Collections, or posting payrolls, etc.) should be trusted employees, and they should be allowed to use the tools to do their job. If they have to be hobbled or monitored, then perhaps they shouldn’t be tr  More...