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Unapply A Payment and Apply an Overpayment

Updated
The Goal: Unapply a payment that was applied to the wrong invoice, then apply the resulting overpayment to the correct invoice — maintaining a full audit trail.

Before You Begin:

  • Payments cannot be unapplied if they have already been deposited. In that case, create a refund for the payment and apply it to the correct area instead.
  • Unapply is not available for payments made through a NAR Ecommerce payment gateway.
  • You can only unapply the full payment — partial unapplications are not supported.
  • Once unapplied, a payment can only be applied to other invoices belonging to the same contact. For example, an overpayment on one broker's account cannot be applied to an invoice belonging to a different individual in one of her offices.
  • If payment is on an individual, the payment can be applied to organizations the individual is related to. If payment is made to an organization, it can be applied to individuals associated with the organization.

Unapply a Payment

  1. Navigate to the desired contact's record and click the Billing tab.
  2. Click the action button for the payment you wish to unapply and select Unapply.Contact billing tab
  3. On the Unapply Payment screen, review the payment details (read-only). IMPORTANT: You can only unapply the full payment, not a partial payment.
  4. Click Unapply. Once unapplied, the payment will display as unapplied, and a credit balance will display in the Balance column. The original invoice to which the payment was applied will be re-opened. Aging days for the invoice will be counted from the original due date, not from the date the payment is unapplied.Billing list with indication of unapplied payment
Note: When a payment is unapplied, the original invoice accounting transaction is reversed.

Use Cases for an Unapplied Payment

Below are two scenarios that show specific examples of unapplying payments and demonstrate where those payments will be reflected in the billing tab:

  • Scenario 1: A staff member unapplies a credit card payment from the back office.
  • Scenario 2: An individual member pays via the Info Hub.

Apply Overpayments

Overpayments may occur because an invoice was not selected when a payment was entered, the payment was entered in error, or a member has sent additional funds toward future purchases. You can view overpayments on the member's Billing tab, or by filtering payments to Overpayment in the All Payments page in the Billing section.

  1. On a contact's record, select the Billing tab.
  2. Click the action button for the payment you wish to apply and choose Apply Payment.List of billing transactions on Billing tab
  3. Select Apply Overpayment.
  4. On the Add Apply Overpayment screen, select the invoice(s) to which you wish to apply the payment.Apply overpayment screenshot
  5. Click Done.
Did You Know? If you have enabled Auto-Apply Credits to Newly Created Invoices under your Finance General Settings, overpayments will automatically be applied to newly created invoices.

View a List of Unapplied Overpayments

To see a list of overpayments that have not yet been applied, go to the Finance, Billing section, click All Payments, and filter to Unapplied Overpayments.Payment filtering options

Common Pitfalls

  • Deposited Payments Cannot Be Unapplied: If a payment has already been deposited, the unapply option will not be available. Create a refund instead.
  • NAR Ecommerce Restriction: Unapply is unavailable for NAR Ecommerce gateway payments — there is no workaround in the back office.
  • Same Contact Only: Unapplied payments can only be re-applied to invoices for the same contact — they cannot be transferred to a different member's account.
  • Partial Unapplications Not Supported: You must unapply the full payment. If you only need to reallocate part of it, consider a refund-and-re-entry approach.

 

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