Payments Accounting and Participant Experience

This guide is meant as a resource to help our partners understand the processes, communications, and reporting practices used by AidKit when administering payments to program participants.

Executive Summary

Welcome to AidKit! This guide to AidKit Grant and Incentive Payment Accounting and Participant Experience is meant as a resource to help our partners understand the processes, communications, and reporting practices used by AidKit when administering payments to program participants. AidKit has developed a robust accounting system to be able to instantaneously determine the status of any payment on any program at all times. This system also supports AidKit’s monthly account reconciliations that align with GAAP (generally accepted accounting principles). Accounting information is available to our partners on their AidKit payments dashboard associated with a live program. In this document we explain how to interpret payment accounting based on payment type and user type. In addition we detail the participant experience of selecting a payment method, and receiving funds.

Background

Participant Experience

Details Associated With Each Payment

Example Payment Reporting Dashboards

Background

AidKit tracks each payment through its full lifecycle. Note that the lifecycle of a payment (aka flow) is slightly different depending on the payment type (ACH vs DEBIT). Here is the overarching flow:

Step 1: An applicant or program participant meets all the required conditions for payment and the payment is initiated in AidKit.

Step 2: The payment goes to AidKit's Payment Approval and Accounting System and then is ready for approval from AidKit’s accounting team.

Note that human approval is required for every payment and can be done first on the client side if desired, and then will be finalized by AidKit staff. For some programs AidKit staff will both approve and finalize the payment.
Payment approvals are only bulk batched when payment amounts are equal and payment volume is in the thousands. Even here a human from AidKit must look over the payments and manually submit as a batch.

Step 3: The payment goes to third party processors (Dwolla, USIO, GiveCard) and funds are distributed.

Step 4: The recipient receives the funds.

For DEBIT ONLY, AidKit receives notification of payment completion.
For ACH ONLY, AK does not receive a positive acknowledgement of payment. We only receive notices of failure. Therefore, we hold the payment in a PENDING state for 2 weeks or until failure is received. After 2 weeks, the payment is moved to COMPLETED if appropriate.

Participant Experience

For participants in a cash program supported by AidKit, the following is an outline of the experience that they have in selecting a payment option, and then receiving payment:

A participant is presented with payment options (ACH and Debit) and,

If a participant chooses ACH:

AidKit asks for the bank name, name on account, account information (number and routing number), and that information is immediately encrypted within the AidKit system.
As soon as the participant is approved for payment they get a notification from AidKit that payment has been initiated.
AidKit provides a participant with the amount paid and the expected time frame for when they should expect the money.
AidKit offers a contact number and email address for follow up if there are issues.
If desired by the program, AidKit can send a follow up survey to confirm receipt of funds.

If a participant chooses debit card:

AidKit is able to mail this card, work with a partner nonprofit or government entity to hold a physical card pick up event, or offer online debit cards.
If a participant elects to get a physical card in the mail:
- The card is shipped to the address the participant provided to AidKit.
- AidKit sends a notification to the participant to 1) associate and 2) activate their card.
- The participant then logs into AidKit using their phone number or email to enter their card details and set their PIN.
- The participant could alternatively call, text or email AidKit support to do this process live over the phone.
- This information is sent via API to card provider and is encrypted (AidKit can’t see the PIN)
AidKit can have the card provider send the card ID directly to AidKit, bypassing the need for participants to manually associate their card.
- In this instance the participant would get the card in the mail with a “please activate” message, and they would do this by setting their PIN directly in the card provider portal.
- *AidKit doesn’t typically recommend this option as it removes a “check” to ensure that the right card gets to the right person.

If a participant opts to receive a physical card during a pickup event:

The Card ID is manually entered during the pickup process into the participant’s record in AidKit, and forwarded via API to the card provider’s system.
The card is activated and a PIN is set in real time via the AidKit system, and forwarded via API to the card provider’s system.
As soon as the card is associated and activated, payment can be made relatively instantaneously (within 30 minutes there are dollars on the card).

If a participant chooses an online card:

AidKit will send them a notification that details all necessary steps to activate the virtual card.
The participant associates and activates the card, and sets the PIN all through the AidKit platform.
AidKit communicates this activity via API to our card partners.
Once a participant’s card is associated and activated the funds are immediately available to them.

If a participant loses their card:

Participants can either reach out to the card provider directly and get a replacement card OR they reach out to AidKit and are supported in obtaining a replacement.
If they reach out to the card provider directly, then the card provider reissues a card and sends AidKit the updated information via API.
If they reach out to AidKit via email or phone a support ticket is created.
A support agent from AidKit is able to view their payment information and support real time triage and reconciliation.

Below is a screenshot of a program participant’s record for a live program in AidKit. A support agent can see the payments associated with the participant in the top right corner, and click in from there for more details:

Details Associated With Each Payment

ACTION ID

Unique reference for the payment.

UID

Unique reference for the recipient.

PROGRAM NAME

Name of the Specific Program through which funds are being distributed.

PAYMENT TYPE

E.g. “grant_payment” vs “ Incentive_payment”.

PAYMENT AMOUNT

The exact dollar amount of the payment.

ACTION DATE

The date that the funds were committed via the AidKit application.

BOOKED DATE

The date that the payment was approved for execution in RoboController (RC) and sent to our third party processor for movement of funds. RC is an internal AidKit tool.

TRANSACTION DATE

The date that the funds were moved out of third party distributor accounts and sent to the recipients.

ACTION STATE: COMPLETED

Payment has successfully completed (for ACH, there is no success acknowledgement. Therefore, the payment is marked complete if we do not receive any failure notice after 2 weeks).

ACTION STATE: PENDING

Payment has been initiated but has not been completed (or in the case of ACH, we have not yet received any failure notice).

ACTION STATE: FAILED

Payment was unsuccessful. In most cases the payment will be reinstated after the issue has been resolved (e.g. bad account number, closed debit card).

ACTION STATE: CANCELED

Payment was canceled before funds were moved to the applicant's account.

ACTION STATE: PROPOSED

Payment has been proposed in the AK system, but has not yet been approved for processing.

ACTION STATE: ANTICIPATED

This is usually tied to a funding action and indicates that we have logged the action for the fund movement, but not yet reconciled it with the corresponding transactions.