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Details of RemitTrac® Wholetail Platform

> Setting Up Lockbox

Processing flexibility begins with the first step of creating a batch of wholesale items or a tray of retail items and transactions.  When a customer’s lockbox number is entered into the system, it will either present a wholesale or retail environment, along with an alert to the operator as to which environment they will be processing.  In a wholesale environment, there are two options for creating a batch: Batch Item Entry, or Batch Registration.  In a retail environment, the operator will be presented with a Tray Registration screen.

BATCH ITEM ENTRY

The first option for creating a batch is Batch Item Entry, where the check amounts are keyed from the physical items. To start a batch, the operator enters the lockbox number.  Next, the batch number, found on the pre-encoded batch header ticket, is entered. To enhance quality control, the system automatically displays the valid payees, special instructions, and the standard processing requirements for the lockbox account. The operator opens the envelope, reviews the payees and special instructions and verifies the negotiability of the check. The operator then key enters the dollar amount of the check(s) contained in the envelope into the electronic journal. Once all of the checks have been entered into the system, the batch of checks (and optionally the accompanying documents, invoices, and envelopes) becomes ready for the initial Image and Data Capture Pass.

BATCH REGISTRATION

The second option for creating a wholesale batch is Batch Registration. The batch is registered in a summary fashion by entering the lockbox number, batch number, number of items (optional), number of rejects (if any), and number of correspondence items (optional). The Batch Registration screen provides the operator with a current list of acceptable payees and special instructions that pertain to the lockbox. Once the batch has been registered, the batch of checks (and optionally the accompanying documents, invoices, and envelopes) is ready for the initial Image and Data Capture Pass.

TRAY REGISTRATION

Retail batches are prepared and sorted into trays by lockbox/customer. With RemitTrac® , only three sorts are required:

  1. Checks-only transactions
  2. Remittances-only transactions
  3. Mixed transactions

There is no requirement to out-sort singles from multiples, change of address, credit card payments, overpayments, underpayments, etc. The tray registration process requires the operator to enter the lockbox number. Once the lockbox number is entered, the associated profile is automatically initiated to the defaults defined in lockbox set-up. The tray number is entered next. Once the tray is registered, the batches of checks (and optionally the accompanying documents, invoices, and envelopes) within the tray become ready for the initial Image and Data Capture Pass. [graphically illustrate this?]

IMAGE AND DATA CAPTURE

When the operator completes the registration process, a batch/tray entry line item appears on the transport queue manager screen to alert the transport operator that the batch or tray is available for capture. Batches and trays are prioritized by cutoff times or by priority level established in the account setup. The transport operator places the corresponding batches or trays in the auto-feeder on the transport and initiates the capture process by touching the auto feed button on the screen. The MICR data and the image of each check, as well as the OCR data (if any) and image of each remittance, invoice, and document in the batch are captured and stored on the database server and image server.

COURTESY / LEGAL AMOUNT RECOGNITION (CAR / LAR)

In RemitTrac® ’s wholetail environment, CAR/LAR automatically processes both wholesale and retail checks captured across multiple transports without operator intervention.  Retail checks are read and compared automatically to the coupon. If a match occurs, based on the rules set up for the lockbox, the transaction is automatically balanced with no additional operator intervention.  Wholesale checks are automatically read and compared to the first keying completed by an operator.  If the two amounts match, the item is balanced with no additional operator intervention. Any checks not read correctly by CAR/LAR, or did not balance with a coupon or key operator, will automatically be presented to an Amount Entry Operator.  CAR/LAR kill rates for retail checks average 75% to 80%. Kill rate for wholesale checks average 70% to 75%.

MCAR/LAR (Machine CAR/LAR) is an additional interpretation engine feature that concentrates on machine printed checks. This is especially effective for business checks.

AMOUNT ENTRY

Images of checks are presented to the Amount Entry operator for key entry of the dollar amounts.  To help improve operator productivity, RemitTrac® ’s Key Ahead feature allows an operator to set the number of keystrokes entered for the screen to flip to the next image. Proficient operators often obtain 3,200 to 4,000 checks per hour.  Average operator throughputs frequently exceed 2,000 items per hour. In wholetail, both wholesale and retail images are continuously displayed for the operator when work is available to be keyed.  This allows the operation to use their best ten-keypad skilled operators to perform this function.  Once a batch has been keyed and there are no out of balance situations, this batch is then presented to the transport operator to be encoded. Any batches that did not balance will be automatically presented to predetermined operators for batch balancing known as reconciliation.

BALANCING

The automated balancing process compares the amounts entered for each wholesale check and retail transaction at Batch Create, CAR, and Amount Entry. If the amounts agree, the batch is released to Power Encode.  If the amounts do not agree, the item is sent to Amount Entry for a second keying of the dollar value and then re-compared.  If the amounts still do not agree, the item is sent to Reconciliation for final balancing.  For retail transactions, the operator has the ability to move, reject or balance these transactions without having to touch the physical items. If two of the three amounts agree, the batch is ready for Power Encode. If the three amounts keyed do not agree, the item is sent to the Exception process.

EXCEPTION PROCESSING

The Exception process displays the items that have been flagged as exceptions. The screen includes an image of the item, the Batch Create/Amount Entry value, and both Amount Verify keyed amounts. The supervisor or authorized operator can key one of the previously entered amounts or the item can be marked to be rejected during the power encode pass.

POWER ENCODING/ENDORSING

An automatic end product of the system is the encoding of the check amounts and deposit tickets.  The Transport Manager displays the batches that are ready to be encoded. The checks are read and the MICR code line is compared to the first pass captured MICR data.  MICR line matching ensures accurate encoding of the dollar amount regardless of the sequence of the documents within the batch. When a match occurs, the item is encoded with the correct dollar amount and endorsed.  The deposit ticket is encoded with the full lockbox specific MICR line including the batch total.  Once a batch has been successfully encoded, its images and data become available for electronic delivery.

Internet (Image) Delivery INTERFACE

Once a batch has been successfully encoded, its images, data, and indices become automatically available to the bank’s Internet delivery solution. ImageScan has successfully interfaced RemitTrac® with several third party archive and delivery vendors, as well as a few in-house developed archive and delivery solutions. RemitTrac® set-up allows you to determine, by lockbox, which accounts requires Internet delivery.  Currently ImageScan uses transports that can capture not only the check, but also the related invoice and other material. 

IMAGE PRINT

Once a batch has been successfully encoded, copies of item images are printed. Image Print also provides an instruction page informing the operator of re-association guidelines. Another feature of Image Print is its capability to produce a mailing address label along with delivery instructions/methods. The delivery instructions are associated to the bank’s calendar. This allows these delivery instructions/methods, as well as the mailing name and address, to be customized by day. A laser printer prints check images, 3 to a page, on standard bond paper. The quality of the image output is consistently high across varied backgrounds. Bank name and logo, audit trail information and a free form marketing message can be printed with each image copy. Our unique check page cutter cuts the page in thirds to produce check size, collated copies.

DATA ENTRY

RemitTrac® ’s wholetail environment offers the unique ability to use our Data Entry Module for both wholesale and retail transactions.  Data Entry can occur immediately after the capture pass, after balancing but prior to the encode pass, or after the encode pass. The input screens automatically display the check or the invoice image as well as all captured data, and are designed to mirror the invoices. Lookup tables are a standard feature and are used in a variety of ways to minimize the data entry task. For example, MICR line fields automatically captured by the transport are used to retrieve remitter names from a lookup table.

RemitTrac® offers you the ability to customize your data entry offerings: from Free Form ICR, Accounts Receivables Matching, Home Owners Association Processing (HOA), Credit Card Processing and Standard ICR.  ImageScan can help your organization with implementing these types of jobs, or we can train your employees to create these environments to suite your particular needs.  Free Form ICR has the capability of locating a word or string of characters and then searching around that word for a specific field.  With the varying types of invoices received in a lockbox operation, this new type of recognition may be the answer to eliminating even more keystrokes in your lockbox department.

MARK SENSE

The Mark Sense Module is used to minimize additional data entry and sorting. Mark Sense is used to identify change of address remittances, to capture multiple payment options, and identify credit card payments.

CUSTOMER REPORTING

RemitTrac® offers a variety of standard reports in several groups, such as deposit reporting, detail item reporting, and end-of-day reporting. Additionally, you can customize any existing reports or create new reports utilizing one of several available methods including the bundled report writer.

FAX

To facilitate the delivery of information to lockbox customers, automatic fax transmission of both standard custom reports and images is available. The fax information is easily created using the Customer Setup Screen and can include multiple names and destination fax numbers. In addition, the number of pages faxed and the number of reports faxed can be tracked for billing purposes.

FLOAT

With float accounting for up to 30 percent of a financial institution’s profit margin – and cutthroat unit pricing eating into those margins – proper float management is vital to a bank’s success.  The optional Float Module for ImageScan’s RemitTrac® wholetail lockbox solution makes it easy for financial institutions to gauge the profitability of schedules for clients and prospects, and to accurately adjust pricing and float availability.  The module calculates and reports both customer and bank float availability, per item, batch and deposit.  One of the easy-to-use features of the float system is flexible float tables that can be setup for each lockbox and processing day.  The tables calculate float availability for each lockbox (specified as a percentage divided over five days) using either encode or deposit cut-off times.  The module provides default, weekend and holiday settings for each table.  To streamline customer reporting, ImageScan’s float module can provide float values for: intra-day feeds to the bank’s mainframe; printed customer deposit reports; files transmitted to customers; and the bank’s image archive.  .

DEPOSIT NOTIFICATION

The system tracks and displays the deposit amount and item count totals, by lockbox, for the Deposit Notification clerk. The clerk selects a lockbox from the list of customers ready to be notified. The screen displays the appropriate lockbox contact information and updates the status of the call. Deposit history for a customer, including detail batch information can be stored on-line for several days.

DATA TRANSMISSION

Four transmission formats, including two standard BAI output file layouts, are provided, as standards with the system.  Additional transmission formats can be created as needed.

IMAGE ARCHIVE

All images captured throughout the day are initially stored on hard disk. As required, images and data are archived to DVD RAM disk or other media for subsequent research.  The Archive and Research module will search the index of processing days using the customer, lockbox, batch, sequence and item dollar amount for first level search criteria.  Selective images or the entire batch may be requested for print. The associated name and address header, outgoing mail instructions and the batch detail listing will all be printed in an identical fashion to the original printed copies.