Who is this article for?
If your clients pay you by Interac e-Transfer, Colib offers a way to automatically reconcile the Interac payments you receive with the invoices created on Colib. Each time you receive a transfer, Colib reads the Interac notification email, finds the client and the invoice, and marks the invoice as paid.
This article explains how to turn the automation on, how the matching works, and how to handle the payments that could not be matched automatically.
Before you start: two steps are required: enter in Colib the email address that receives your Interac notifications, then set up an automatic forwarding rule in that mailbox. You need access to the practice settings, and access to your mailbox settings (Gmail, Outlook, etc.).
1Turn on the automation in Colib
- Go to Settings > Payments (www.colib.io/settings?show=payment).
- Scroll to the Interac payments section.
- Turn on Enable Interac automation.
- In Email address receiving Interac payment confirmation emails, enter the email address that receives the notification every time your company receives an Interac payment. If you receive them at several addresses, separate them with a semicolon, for example payments@example.com;billing@example.com.
- Click Save.
Colib refuses an address that is not valid, an address ending with @payments.interac.ca (enter your own address, not Interac's), and an address already configured for another clinic: each address can only be used by one Colib account.
2Forward the Interac emails to Colib
Each mailbox entered in step 1 must automatically forward the Interac confirmation emails to Colib. Without this step, no payment will be recorded.
- Go to your email provider and set up an automatic email forwarding rule for all emails received from notify@payments.interac.ca.
- Forward them to interac@colib.io.
Step-by-step guides:
- Gmail / Google Workspace: How to automatically forward Interac notification emails in Gmail?
- Outlook / Microsoft 365: How to automatically forward Interac notification emails in Outlook / Microsoft 365?
If you are using Google as your mail provider: Gmail sends a confirmation request to interac@colib.io that our team must approve. Send an email to support@colib.io to let us know that you have set up the automatic forward, and indicate the date of the set up as well.
Colib analyzes these emails to extract information about Interac payments. We guarantee the security of this email address: it is used only by our program to retrieve the emails, and the emails received are not viewed by anyone. After being processed, emails received in interac@colib.io are automatically deleted. Do not hesitate to contact us if you have technical difficulties: support@colib.io.
How payments are matched with invoices
Payment reconciliations occur several times per day (around 7:15 AM, 12:15 PM, 3:40 PM and 8:00 PM, Pacific time). Each time, Colib pulls the new Interac e-Transfer notifications and applies the following rules.
| Rule | What Colib does |
|---|---|
| Finding the client | The sender's name is compared with the first and last name of your active clients (upper case, accents and hyphens do not matter), or with the Interac name remembered from a previous manual match (see below). |
| Invoices considered | Invoices of that client that are not paid, cancelled or draft, dated within the last 6 months, and whose balance is at least the amount received. If the client is the person responsible for a group of clients (a family, for example), the invoices of every member of the group are considered. |
| Choosing the invoice | First, an invoice whose balance is exactly the amount received. Otherwise, an invoice already partially paid by e-Transfer. Otherwise, the first invoice found. |
| Amount equal to the balance | The invoice becomes Paid, with the e-Transfer as payment method. |
| Amount lower than the balance | The invoice becomes Partially paid and the remaining balance is updated. A next transfer from the same client completes it. |
| Amount higher than every balance | No invoice is matched: the payment stays with the status Client found and you are notified. Match it by hand (one payment can only pay one invoice). |
| Reference and message | The Interac reference and the sender's message are displayed in the Details column, but they are not used for the matching. |
| Currency | Interac e-Transfers are in Canadian dollars: use them for invoices in CAD. A manual match is only possible with an invoice in CAD. |
Important: create the invoice in Colib before the Interac payment is made. A payment received before its invoice exists is not matched later on its own: it stays in the list (Client found or No matching) and you receive a notification. Once the invoice is created, match the payment by hand (step 3 below).
3Follow and match your Interac payments
- Go to www.colib.io/invoices?show=interac (or Invoices, then Interac Payments in the menu on the left). This menu appears once the automation is turned on.
- The list shows the payments received with their Date, Status, Sender, Amount, Client, Invoice and Details. By default it starts about five weeks back: change From, To or Status to see other payments.
To manually reconcile a payment, select the client, then the invoice associated with the payment. The change is saved as soon as you choose; only the unpaid invoices of the client in CAD are offered, and an invoice whose balance is lower than the payment is refused.
Our platform keeps a record of the client matching you create between an Interac sender and a client. The next time a payment is made by this client, Colib automatically recognizes which client it belongs to, even if the name used for Interac is different from the name in the client record. Step by step, your payment flow will become fully automated.
| Status | Meaning and what you can do |
|---|---|
| Matched | The client and the invoice are identified. The revoke icon (Revoke matching) cancels the match: the invoice goes back to Partially paid or unpaid, and the remembered Interac name of the client is forgotten. |
| Client found | The client is identified but no invoice fits. Choose the invoice in the Invoice column. |
| No matching | No client could be identified. Choose the client, then the invoice. |
| Ignored | The trash icon (Ignore) sets aside a payment that does not concern your clients (a personal transfer, for example). |
| Analyzed - error | The email could not be read. Record the payment on the invoice by hand and contact us if it happens often. |
Each reconciliation can be modified or deleted at any time. Matching, revoking and ignoring payments require the Create-Edit-Delete level for the client's financial information; the list only shows the clients whose financial information you can see.
After a payment is reconciled
- On the invoice — after being reconciled, Interac payments are visible in the Payments section of the invoice, with the type Interac e-Transfer.
- Receipt — if you have enabled Automatically send receipt when a payment has been recorded. in Settings > Invoices (www.colib.io/settings?show=invoices), the receipt is automatically sent once an invoice has been attached (either automatically or manually) to the Interac payment, provided that the amount sent matches the invoice balance. No receipt is sent for a partial payment.
- Notifications — you receive an internal Colib notification (bell icon) each time a payment has been successfully and automatically reconciled, or a mismatch is detected during reconciliation. It goes to the client's practitioner, or to the account owner if the practitioner has no access to financial information.
Good to know
- Only received transfers count — notifications about money you sent, or reminders that funds are about to expire, are ignored.
- Nothing happens? — check that the forwarding rule is turned on, that Interac emails do not land in your spam or junk folder, and that the address entered in Colib is the one that receives the Interac notifications.
- Turning the automation off — turn off Enable Interac automation and save: the addresses are removed and the Interac Payments menu disappears. Remember to remove the forwarding rule from your mailbox too.
- Refunds — an Interac payment cannot be refunded from Colib. See How to refund a payment?
- Other manual payments — for cash or cheque, see How can I record an offline or manual payment on an invoice?
Still have a question?
Write to us at support@colib.io, we will be happy to help.
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