How Does it All Work?
How Much Does it Cost?
What if We Can't Collect?
Do We Simply Forget About Uncollectable Invoices?
Bankruptcy
Payments: Taking & Making Them
The AR/C Portfolio of Receivables
University Invoices -- The AR/C Process
Need to Talk to Us?
Campus Billing Services is the accounts receivable and collections office for UCI, serving over 125 different campus departments. We enjoy a collection success rate of better than 98% on a portfolio exceeding $30 million annually, excluding patient billings for UCIMC and the UCI Medical Plaza, and University Extension collections, which are handled independently.
Campus policy requires departments whose invoices exceed $20.00 to bill via central receivables processing. An advantage of doing so is that the department has immediate use of the income as soon as the receivable is recorded on the general ledger, even though the bill might not be paid right away.
Invoices are prepared by departments to bill for goods and services they provide. Information provided on the invoice is entered by Campus Billing Services into the Accounts Receivable & Collections (AR/C) System, and the data is passed directly to the general ledger. The departmental income account specified on the invoice is credited, and the debit recorded as a campus receivable, a valuable promise to pay by the party being billed (the debtor).
Campus Billing Services performs the collection function for outstanding invoices, notifying debtors when balances become 30, 60 or 90 days past due, and the Central Cashier posts the payments to clear the receivable from AR/C and the general ledger.
In addition to sending out statements for each account with an outstanding balance, Campus Billing Services works with debtors to advise them of their rights and responsibilities, negotiates and monitors special payment arrangements and sets up payroll deductions for the debts of UCI employees. We work closely with the departments we serve to research invoice information or payment history and to provide regular reports of invoice activity and outstanding balances.
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We charge a modest $2.50 per invoice for our collection services, which typically includes at least three monthly statements mailed for each unpaid invoice, with penalties added as applicable to encourage prompt payment. In addition, we serve as liaison between debtors and departments, freeing their staff time for other duties. We contact debtors by phone, letter, or e-mail to advise them of their rights and responsibilities, and to negotiate and monitor special payment arrangements. We research invoices and payments, perform limited skip tracing, and provide documentation and information to debtors and to departments as requested.
Each month we bill you for our collection fees using the interdepartmental recharge system, and we send you a list of the invoices processed during the period, plus monthly departmental reports showing detail about who has paid for their invoices, and who hasn't. We work with you to minimize delinquencies and to resolve disputes, and to ensure that your department suffers minimum losses from bad debts.
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Twice annually a detailed review of the accounts receivable portfolio is made, and departments are notified of invoices with the potential for write-off from the general ledger.
The Vice Chancellor for Administrative and Business Services reviews the list and approves invoices for write-off, at which time the department's income account is debited by journal for each uncollectable invoice.
Departments receive a monthly outstanding invoices list which may be used as a budgeting tool to monitor the amount of income which they may potentially lose during a write-off. Items with a bill status of "37", "38" or "39" are under review or in the write-off process. Please see Accounts Receivable Reports.
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Not a chance; most written- off invoices are referred to various collection agencies with which the University has contracted. Agency employees write, phone or otherwise contact debtors and perform more in-depth skip tracing.
Large accounts are processed for litigation by the in-house staff at the agencies, and the majority of cases are settled without actually going to trial.
Each agency receives a commission on amounts recovered, and more for litigated accounts. Once the debtor has paid the collection agency in full, the debt is entirely forgiven, although the department receives an amount net of the agency's commissions, typically 50% - 70% of the amount collected. This income from written-off bills is distributed by monthly journal directly to the originating department's income accounts.
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Federal bankruptcy law and campus policies prevent us from trying to collect on invoices which have been included in a federal bankruptcy claim.
Notices of bankruptcy filing are forwarded to the Campus Bankruptcy Coordinator in Loan Services. That office canvasses various campus departments for information regarding outstanding debts, and a proof of claim is submitted to the court for all known debts to UCI. While the case is pending, all attempts to collect must stop, as must penalties for non-payment, according to state and federal laws.
Once the case is completed, all dischargeable debts are forgiven and outstanding balances are written off, to appear on ledger as a debit to the original billing department's income. If the case is dismissed, the debts are returned to active status and collection efforts resume. Contact the Campus Bankruptcy Coordinator when you need specific information regarding bankruptcy matters.
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The best advice is don't accept invoice payments, if you can help it. Please direct your customers to send payments to the UCI Central Cashier's Office, Irvine, CA 92697-1975. Checks received as invoice payments by the department should be sent directly the to Central Cashier's Office, and not deposited on a departmental deposit advice.
Remember, your department receives its income when the invoice is posted. The payment needs to go to the proper receivables account to clear the balance off campus books. If you accept an invoice payment, and deposit it into your departmental accounts, the payment will not be applied to the customer's account. UCI will be in the embarrassing position of billing your customer needlessly, and your departmental income will be incorrectly inflated.
It won't happen very often, but if your department decides to pay for a particular invoice, this is typically done by financial journal. If you contact our office to let us know of your intention, we will note in the affected account that we are expecting a payment from you, and then we'll watch for it so that we can adjust AR/C. We will also help you prepare the journal paperwork, providing you with the proper account and fund to credit, as well as the appropriate references, which vary depending on the type of debt you are retiring.
And a word about late charges --
Payments are applied to an invoice "top down," meaning the late charges are cleared first, then the remainder applied to the invoice balance due your department. Logic dictates that if this were not the case, we'd soon be out of business, because some debtors try to avoid paying late charges by not including them in their payment. This leaves a balance on the invoice when the payment is applied first to late charges. Often they will call your department with a sad story about how they never got the bill, and you may be tempted to tell them that we will surely waive/cancel the late charges under those circumstances.
Since the remaining balance is part of your invoice amount (remember, the late charges are already paid), the only way to clear the balance is by your doing a cancellation of invoice for the portion you want waived/canceled. Since you probably don't want to give up your income any more than we do, it's best not to speculate about late charges. Please ask them to pay the balance to clear their account.
If you wish to verify information regarding invoices, payments, or an account, you may contact Campus Billing Services during our regular business hours of 8:30 am - 4:30 pm, Monday through Friday, or e-mail us at cbs@uci.edu.
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Following is a list of procedures describing the preparation of University invoices.
After some sections a link is provided with a button 
. Click on these for detailed explanations of the
process.
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Campus Billing Services is pleased to assist you with a variety of billing concerns.
We welcome any questions or suggestions you may have which will help us to serve you better. Please call or visit us between the hours of 8:30 am to 4:30 p.m., Monday - Friday.
CAMPUS BILLING SERVICES
109 Aldrich Hall
Irvine, CA 92697-3020
Phone: (949) 824-2455 or (949) UCI-BILL
FAX: (949) 824-9807
cbs@uci.edu
Go to the
CBS Home Page for other information.[top]