This guide includes setup and processes for actions that your association may take for overdue members. Feel free to pick and choose the processes here that will help you collect overdue payments from your members.

If you have questions about whether a particular setting or workflow is right for your association, use the provided notes section and contact our support team to discuss your questions.

Table of Contents

In-App Training:

Click the “Need Help?” sidebar on the right side of any GrowthZone screen to open our new Resource Center. You’ll find interactive guides and training to help you configure the system, as suggested below. Look for the “Show me in GrowthZone” link in this document. That link will take you to an in-app guide to walk you through those steps in more detail.  

Intro: Outline Your Association’s Processes

Defining Your Timeline  

Each association has unique process, procedures, and schedules for tracking and collecting overdue invoices. The processes defined in this document are designed to support your needs. Use the blank timeline below to outline when your association will take different actions on overdue invoices, like adding late fees or dropping members.

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1. Collect 2022 and 2023 Dues from New Members

After invoicing your active members for 2023 dues, GrowthZone can help you collect dues from new members for both the remainder of 2022 and all of 2023.

1.1 Create Prorated 2022 Dues Invoice and Full 2023 Dues Invoice  

Setup > Memberships, Membership Settings > Proration Settings tab

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• Enable Bill Next Cycle Now

  • The system will create a prorated invoice for the remainder of the current billing cycle and an invoice for the next billing cycle. Once enabled in Membership Settings, this must also be enabled for each membership type you want to use. Open the pricing popup for a membership type, enable advanced options, and then check the box for “Bill Next Cycle”.

• Set Lead Days to Charge Next Bill

  • Per billing frequency, the number of days before a new billing cycle that the system will create an invoice for the current billing cycle and the next billing cycle. You generally want this to start on or slightly before the day you create invoices for your active members’ association dues.

  • Example: If you send out invoices on October 1st, you may want to set the Annual frequency to 95 days. For 2022, this means that any member who joins on or after Wednesday September 28th will be invoiced for their 2022 and 2023 dues after submitting their application.

  • NOTE: This setting applies to all memberships in your system, so be sure to review the settings for all billing frequencies that you

1.2 Capture Credit Card on Application and Charge on Membership Approval 

Setup > Memberships, Application Forms

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• Disable Automatically Approve Applications

  • You and your staff should have a chance to review applications before approving them. This gives you a chance to review the membership application and confirm that they applied for the right type of membership. If enabled, this setting will prevent you from enabling the next setting.

• Enable Capture Payment Profile and Charge on Approval

  • Applicants must provide a credit card before submitting a membership application. When you’re ready to approve the new member, the system will charge their provided credit card.

  • NOTE: When used in conjunction with the Bill Next Cycle Now feature from section 1.1 above, the system will create two charges with your payment processor: One charge for the prorated 2022 invoice/dues and one charge for the full 2023 invoice/dues. The 2023 invoice will be dated 1/1/2023, which may create an AR credit that rolls over from 2022 to 2023. Depending on how many members join your association at the end of the year, you may want to discuss this with your accountant before turning on this setting.

1.3 Process Submitted Membership Applications 

Memberships > Submitted Applications tab

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• Review and Approve Membership Application

  • For current and future pending applications, click on the Gavel icon to view the applicant’s information. The View Application button will show information as it was entered on the form.

2. Late Fees

Late fees in GrowthZone are added to unpaid invoices. You’ll select the overdue invoices that should receive a late fee and then add the late fee. Members who never received a dues invoice will not have a late fee added.

Late fees are added as a new line item on the original invoice. The late fee line item will have an “invoice date” of the date that the late fee was added. This ensures that you do not unintentionally create new AR activity in a previously closed month.

2.1 Setting up Late Fees 

Setup > Services, Products, and Commerce; Fee Items

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• Create Late Fee - Fee Items

  • Create a new fee item and set the Fee Item Type to Late Fee. Set the Product Category and Description fields as you’d like. Work with your accountant to set the appropriate Income, Receivables, and Deposit Accounts. Do not check the Is Recurring Fee checkbox. If you add multiple late fees to overdue association dues invoices, you can use the same fee item for each round of late fees if all the money goes to the same GL accounts.

2.2 Flag Contacts to Exclude 

Contacts> Profile tab

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Define Tag to Exclude Members from Late Fees
If you allow members to make special arrangements to pay their dues on an alternate schedule to avoid late fees, the best way to exclude these members from receiving a late fee (or suspension) is to apply a tag to their contact. You can exclude these members when filtering the list of invoices to receive late fees. Example tag: “No Late Fees”

2.3 Add Late Fees

Memberships> Unpaid tab> Customize Results

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• Filter Unpaid Invoices to Overdue Association Dues Invoices
  By default, this screen lists all open invoices for membership dues. Filter by membership type, invoice date, and tag so that only the correct overdue invoices will receive a late fee:

  • Membership Types: All association memberships

  • Invoice Date: Date used on the initial run of association dues invoices. (This excludes any members who have joined recently)

  • Exclude Tags: Tag created in step 2.2. above. (This excludes any members who have made alternate plans to pay their membership dues and avoid late fees.)

• Add Late Fees to Selected Invoices

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  • Select the fee item you created in step 2.1 above and set the desired price of the late fee. Click Apply Changes to add the late fees. Depending on how many invoices you’re adding late fees to, this may take a couple of hours.

2.4 Notify Members of Late Fees 

Memberships> Unpaid tab> Actions> Email Invoices | Print Invoices

Email or Print Invoices with Late Fees
After adding late fees to invoices, you may want to notify your members that they now owe a late fee. You can quickly email or print those invoices from the Unpaid tab while reusing the same filtering you used to add the late fees.

If you would like to review creating an email template or emailing invoices, review sections 4.2 and 6.2 of the Association Dues Billing Guide.

3. Drop Unpaid Members

Drop unpaid members when you no longer expect to collect their dues from them and are ending your collection process. Once dropped, a former member can be reactivated by staff or they can fill out your membership application again.

3.1 Drop Members

3.1.1 Filter Unpaid Invoices to Overdue Dues Invoices

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Memberships> Unpaid tab> Customize Results
By default, this screen lists all open invoices for membership dues. Filter by membership type, invoice date, and tag so that only the members who have the correct overdue invoices will be dropped:

• Membership Types: All association memberships

• Invoice Date: Date used on initial run of association dues invoices. (This excludes any members who have recently joined)

• Exclude Tags: Tags added to prevent a member from being dropped. (Review step 2.2 for more information about excluding contacts by tag)

3.1.2 Notify Dropped Members

Memberships> Unpaid tab> Actions> Email Invoices | Print Invoices
Before dropping members, you should notify them that their membership with your association has ended. It’s important to do this step before dropping the member because if you write off the invoices, you will no longer be able to email or print the invoices from this tab.

If you would like to review creating an email template or emailing invoices, review sections 4.2 and 6.2 of the Association Dues Billing Guide.  

3.1.3 Drop Members Associated with Selected Invoices

Memberships> Unpaid tab> Actions> Drop Members

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This screen walks through options for removing a variety of benefits from dropped members. The most important option is whether to leave unpaid invoices open or to write them off. GrowthZone suggests writing off the open invoices to keep your accounting records clear and to avoid confusion if the member rejoins in the future. Depending on how many members you’re dropping, this may take a couple of hours.