Automated Clearing House
The article will explain how the Automated Clearing House (ACH) system is represented in the Adonis Personnel Manager.
About
The Automated Clearing House (ACH) is an electronic funds-transfer system that facilitates payments in the US. The ACH is run by the National Automated Clearing House Association (NACHA). The NACHA operates to facilitate the growth of electronic payments throughout the US for payroll, direct deposit, consumer bills, tax payments, and more.
ACH transactions share similarities with paper-based checks, however, the primary difference is that the payment is completed digitally. Therefore, they are often referred to as Electronic funds transfers (EFTs) or eChecks.
Adonis Interface
Adonis has introduced the ACH files that should be compatible with any bank that uses ACH system.
Our customers perform the transfers from the Adonis system via PNC Bank and Bank of America. The interface to PNC bank has been implemented a while ago, so it works slightly different in Adonis than the newly added ACH format, which works with Bank Of America and should be universal to work with the other banks using ACH system.
How to produce the files and the necessary setup is described next.
Global Options
Setup company information for the electronic transfers under Setup > Global Options > Modules > Payroll > Telepay > Bank Format > PNC Bank or Bank of America.
Organization setup
Define the company bank account under Setup > Organization Structure > Crew Pool > Payroll > Electronic payment.
If you use a single company bank account for all the employees and all the employees are paid in USD, then enable the option "Select bank account for Net pay based on the employee payment currency". If you are using multiple company bank accounts with the same currency code, don't use this option.
Under Balance Actions tab make sure that the needed Balance Action is enabled. Either PNC or Automatic Clearing House.
General Codes setup
When using the newest ACH format in Adonis (not the PNC bank format), link the company bank to the Bank Of America Bank Transfer format under Setup > General Codes > Payroll > Banks.
This settings is only needed for the company bank, not needed for the employees' receiver banks.
Employee setup
To make the ACH transfer for the employee, he needs to be linked to the respective Balance Action (PNC or Automatic Clearing House) with all the necessary banking details under Payroll > Payment.
If you are using a single company bank account for payments, then in Organization settings you've enabled the option to select it on all the employees and you don't require to make any more settings on the employees.
If you are using multiple company bank accounts, every employee also needs to be linked to the Payment bank account under Payroll > Payment.
You can link a batch of employees to the needed Balance Action using the Common Entry routine in the Crew List right-click menu.
How to generate ACH files
Advance transfer
Add the advance payroll entry with the Payroll Additional Info, calculate and save.
Go to Payroll > Reports > Current > Advance List > Payment (Preview will not create the ACH file)
Make the correct crew and company bank account selection (if there is only one, it will be selected by default).
The Advance List report will list all the transactions included in the ACH file.
After you close the Advance List report, the ACH file will be received in slightly different ways depending on the Balance Action that you've used. See description below.
Month End transfer
Employee Net Wage EC 994 will be automatically linked to the banking details that you've saved under Payroll > Payment.
Go to Payroll > Reports > Current> Payment List
Make the correct crew and company bank account selection (if there is only one, it will be selected by default).
The Advance List report will list all the transactions included in the ACH file.
After you close the Payment List report, the ACH file will be received in slightly different ways depending on the Balance Action that you've used. See description below.
Bank of America (Automatic Clearing House)
When you close the Advance or Payment List report, the system will open the export window, where you can select the path and export the ACH file.
You will be asked to lock the exported amounts.
PNC Bank
When you close the Advance or Payment List report, you will be asked to add the Descriptive date.
Then you will get the confirmation that the file has been generated and you will be asked to lock the exported amounts.
The ACH file can be picked from the Payroll > Electronic Payment > PNC Bank > Advance or Payment.
File Format
File structure
Record name | Mandatory (M) | Short description |
|---|---|---|
File Header Record | M | The File Header Record designates physical file characteristics. It also identifies the Bank as the Immediate Destination and the company as the Immediate Origin of the file. |
Company/Batch Header Record | M | The Company Batch Header Record identifies the company, briefly describes the Entry Detail Records in the batch and designates the effective entry date. |
Entry Detail Record | M | One Entry Detail Record is created for each entry. It contains the information required to post the entry to the payee’s account or post the entry to the receiving company’s account. |
Addenda Record | O | One optional addenda record may be associated with each Entry Detail Record. The Addenda Record contains additional payment-related information about the immediately preceding Entry Detail Record. |
Company/Batch Control Record | M | The Company/Batch Control Record concludes the batch and contains the item count and dollar totals for the Entry Detail Records in the batch. |
File Control Record | M | The File Control record contains dollar, entry and hash totals from the file’s Company/Batch Control Records. This record also contains counts of the blocks and batches in the file. |
The specification file is attached here.
File sample