Future Fees/Fines: Collections agency interactions - when patron pays agency

From: Holly L. Mistlebauer
Sent: Thursday, July 18, 2019 5:04 AM
To: Joanne Elisa Leary <jl41@cornell.edu>; Sharon Marcus Beltaine <slm5@cornell.edu>
Subject: RE: CUC Collections

Joanne, I have a follow-up question about this very old email about sending fees/fines to collections…

So CUL doesn’t care if the patron every pays CUC? By that I mean that CUL marks the bill as “Paid - sent to CUC” and never knows if the patron actually paid CUC or not. Is that true?

I need to know because getting data back from CUC adds a layer of complexity.

Thanks,
Holly

From: Chris Manly
Sent: Friday, August 17, 2018 8:25 AM
To: Holly L. Mistlebauer <hlm7@cornell.edu>
Subject: Re: FOLIO User Information Question

This, and one other issue coming from RA-SIG (the need for a ‘department’ field) have come in recently. I’ll bring them to the SIG in e-mail.

–
Christopher Manly
Director of Library Systems
CU Library Information Technologies
607-255-3344

From: Holly Mistlebauer <hlm7@cornell.edu>
Date: Wednesday, August 15, 2018 at 2:13 PM
To: Chris Manly <cam2@cornell.edu>
Subject: FOLIO User Information Question

Hi Chris. I have another User Information question. For fees/fines we need a flag that indicates if the user is deceased. If a user is marked as inactive and owes fees/fines, many libraries will send them to a collection agency. If we know the person is deceased, we would like to mark them as such so that they are not sent to a collection agency (libraries just take the loss). Also, the collection agency will often contact the library and tell them the user is deceased. We would like to be able to update User Information to reflect that when it becomes known. This wouldn’t be a flag that is automatically updated, but one that is manually updated by library staff when information is known.
Thanks,
Holly

From: Joanne Elisa Leary
Sent: Tuesday, April 24, 2018 4:12 PM
To: Sharon Marcus Beltaine; Holly L. Mistlebauer
Subject: RE: CUC Collections

Sharon,
I am somewhat familiar with the process, although it’s been about 9 years since I’ve had any involvement with it, so I can’t guarantee my memory is accurate. The cycle (run monthly) involves selecting bills that are unpaid and that meet certain criteria for age and patron total owed. Each timeframe gets a different set of actions. The newest bills (less than a month old?) are reviewed to cancel out those that fall under a certain cumulative dollar total for the patron (<$25). The patrons whose bills make a total of >= $25 are sent a reminder notice about the unpaid amounts. The next batch of bills are those that were already sent one reminder letter and are between 30 – 60 days old. Those bills are reviewed and the patrons sent a second reminder, warning them about the impending action of being sent to Collections. I think the next batch are those that are 60-90 days old; I’m not sure if those patrons get a third letter, or if they are then sent to Collections. When the bills are finally sent to Collections, they are closed (marked Paid - sent to CUC).

To do this in Folio, we would need to replicate the selection process (based on bill age and patron total). We would need to update the bill records accordingly, annotating them about the action taken, and closing the bills as appropriate. Is this enough info to make a user story?

Joanne

From: Sharon Marcus Beltaine
Sent: Tuesday, April 24, 2018 3:47 PM
To: Holly L. Mistlebauer <hlm7@cornell.edu>; Joanne Elisa Leary <jl41@cornell.edu>
Subject: CUC Collections

Holly, Joanne,
I just walked through a process Michelle Hubbell runs to send outstanding charges for staff and faculty to CU Collections. Are you familiar with this process? Is someone working on the user stories for us to be able to accomplish this in Folio?
All the best,
Sharon