Reminders for offer replies and instalments
How the Education pack reminds applicants before an offer reply-by date and students before an instalment is due, and the rules that govern each reminder.
By Achekam · · 4 min read · For Education businesses in South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya
Launching soon. The Industry CRM add-on described in this article is launching soon. This article describes it as it will work at launch.
Two dates cause more avoidable trouble in a college office than any others. The first is the date by which an applicant must reply to an offer: miss it, and a place sits empty that another applicant would have taken. The second is the date an instalment falls due: miss that, and the finance office spends the next month chasing money it could have had on time.
Neither is usually missed on purpose. The applicant meant to reply and forgot. The parent knew the instalment was coming but not that it was this week. A short, well-timed nudge fixes most of it. The Education pack in Achekam's Industry CRM can send both, and this article explains when they go, how, and the rules your administrator controls.
Two reminders for two different people
| Reminder | Who receives it | When |
|---|---|---|
| Offer reply-by | The applicant | 5 days before the reply-by date on the offer |
| Instalment due | The student | 7 days before the instalment's due date |
The timings are set in the pack. Both reminders come before the date, not after it: they are prompts to act, not complaints that someone has failed to.
Five days before an offer lapses
When an offer is made, it carries a reply-by date. Five days before that date, the pack can remind the applicant that the offer is waiting for them. Its purpose is to reach applicants who have not yet signed the acceptance, because until they do, the application cannot move on to Offer accepted and the place is neither filled nor free.
Five days is enough time for an applicant to read the offer properly, talk it over at home and sign, without being so early that the reminder is forgotten as well.
Seven days before an instalment falls due
Each student's enrolment carries a fee plan of instalments. A week before an instalment is due, the pack can remind the student that it is coming.
There is one dependency your finance team must understand. In the pack, an instalment is marked paid by a person. Nothing marks it paid automatically. So the instalment record is only as accurate as the bursar's work: if a family paid early and nobody marked the instalment as paid, the pack still shows it as outstanding, and a reminder about money already sent is the quickest way to irritate a parent. Keep the paid marks up to date, so the record the reminders work from matches what families have actually paid.
If the payer is a parent or a sponsor rather than the student, make sure the student knows the reminder is a cue to pass on, or that the payer's details are where the institution's correspondence goes.
E-mail and in-app only
The Industry CRM's reminders go by e-mail and in-app. There is no SMS and no WhatsApp. That is worth planning around:
- Check that every applicant and student record has a working e-mail address before the reminders are switched on.
- Tell families at enrolment that fee reminders will come by e-mail, and from which address, so they do not end up unread in a spam folder.
- For families who rely on their phones and rarely open e-mail, keep your own way of reaching them, such as a phone call from the finance office.
Off until switched on, sent once, capped each day
Three rules govern every customer reminder in the pack, and both of these are customer reminders:
- Off by default. Each reminder stays off until a workspace administrator switches it on. Nothing goes to applicants or students the moment the pack is activated.
- Sent at most once. A reminder goes once for the date it relates to. The pack does not keep repeating it.
- A daily cap. The number of reminders sent is limited by a cap each day, which helps protect your institution's e-mail reputation during a busy intake.
The second rule is the one to remember. If an applicant ignores the five-day reminder, the pack will not chase them again; a person in admissions should, by phone, before the offer lapses.
Before the date and after it
These reminders work before a date. Achekam's credit control, which is switched on for new workspaces, works after one: once a day it e-mails overdue reminders on unpaid invoices, by default at 7, 14 and 30 days overdue, and a monthly statement to customers with a balance. It never charges anyone, and it records whether each e-mail was sent. Together they cover both sides of credit control in the wider sense, which Investopedia explains as managing the credit a business extends to customers so that it supports sales while limiting bad debts.
Put together, a family on an instalment plan may receive a reminder a week before an instalment, and then, if the invoice behind it goes unpaid past its terms, an overdue reminder from credit control. Read both sets of wording side by side before you switch anything on, so the tone is consistent and nobody gets a stern overdue notice for an instalment that was never late. How invoices and instalments relate is covered in fee instalments as part payments.
A checklist for switching them on
- Confirm every enrolment has its instalment dates entered, and every offer its reply-by date.
- Bring the "paid" marks on instalments up to date.
- Check e-mail addresses on applicant and student records.
- Ask your administrator to switch on the offer reply-by reminder first, and watch one intake cycle.
- Then switch on the instalment reminder, and agree who follows up by phone when a reminder is ignored.
Reminders are the gentle end of fee administration. When they are not enough, the questions move to the books: what has been received, what is still owed and what the institution has actually earned. For that, see releasing tuition over the term and what to do with overpaid fees and students who leave.
General guidance only, not advice on your own circumstances. Tax and payroll rules change: check the current position with the authority or your adviser.
