Integrator – Vericred Interface NMMU Perspective Session 30 Integrator UG 2015 Greg Saunders NMMU ICT Services

Introduction Interface written in 2014-2015 between Adapt IT and Vericredit to streamline data transfer between 2 Service Providers in Higher Education Many Adapt IT clients use Vericredit to perform Debt Collection Services for then NMMU Approached by Adapt IT to evaluate the interface and to do Beta Testing NMMU is an existing Vericred Client NMMU has Adapt IT written Local Software to upload information into student debtors and GL Interface delivered for Testing January 2015

High Level Process 1 Identify student with Debt to Hand Over to Vericred Run Initial Upload and verify that the correct students with the correct balances are identified Run program in Final Mode to send information to Vericred Transactions then transferred to Debt Collection Account Type Summary of Student Account is sent i.e Summary of All Debits (Capital) Credits (Payments) and Interest Changed Biographical detail of Students also sent Should sign a non disclosure agreement prior to commencement of contact – POPI Act

High Level Process 2 Decide in conjunction with Vericred how often programs must be run to transfer information between Vericred and Integrator As agreed then run program to do transfer When run program will transfer any transactions for the handed over students that have occurred on the Vericred System to Integrator into the Debt Collection Account Type Program will also transfer any transactions that have occurred since the last transfer on the Integrator System to Vericred Reconcile the information Client and Vericred to settle accounts Information on both systems should mirror each other

Setups Required Technical Setups Firewall and IP Address setups to allow Vericred access to information on Integrator Server. Adapt IT, Own Technical Staff and Vericred System setups – Debt Collection Account Type 1 on the system Which Account Types to include for Debt Collection Number of transaction Types and events Student Types to include for Debt collection – in order to exclude foreign students Integrator Status Codes in order to include or exclude specific groups of students

Interface Overview FSDC -1 Students Flagged for Collection A Query screen to check which Students have been handed Over FSDC -2 Initial Transfer of Students – Transfer of a batch of students FSDC -3 Transfer of Transaction – Between the 2 systems FSDC – 4 Download of Student Statuses – Statuses at Vericred FSDC- 5 Maintain Statuses – Vericred Statuses FSDC -6 Reconciliation Report

Interface FSDC -1 Students at Vericred

Interface FSDC -2 Initial Hand Over

Interface FSDC -2 Initial Hand Over

NMMU Testing Approach and Findings 1 Identify a sample of students Both Active Debt Students and Bad Debt Students Setup system to extract only for those students Adapt IT added parameter to include only selected linked to student status Useful if institution uses more than one debt collector If run in final mode students will be linked to another student status automatically Balances did not match balance on student account NMMU data error data will have to be fixed as part of go live process Need mechanism to verify biographical data sent. Adapt IT are investigating options Existing FSDC-2 Program – Intellicard must be moved

NMMU Testing Approach and Findings 2 How to setup system for data already at Vericred Vericred Statuses – Currently Active, Debt Review, Handover and Legal NMMU has proposed additions including Bad Debt and Settled – under investigation Bad / Written off Debt Interface is designed so that info in the Debt Collection Account Type mirrors Student’s account at Vericred NMMU periodically “writes off” bad debt Vericred instructed to continue to collect debt owing Balance on NMMU Student Account 0 Internal to NMMU only – student still owes money Integrator Student Status to indicate written off debt Application, registration or print statement stopped Interface cannot handle this. Solution being discussed

NMMU Current Testing Status Not currently live Solutions or work around’s must be found esp. for Bad Debt students Testing Staff initially wary of different system, now more positive Data transfer is working Institution’s Debt Collection Process must be modified to match new interface together with Vericred and Adapt IT if necessary. In their absence, A Big Thank you to Rene van Wyk and Saolme van der Riet for Their Testing and Effort 