Follow-up Date and Time

The Follow-up Date is the next date to contact the account holder regarding a loan. For example, if a user tried to call the account holder but got a busy signal, they may want to try again the next day. Or if a letter is sent, the user may want to follow-up with the account holder in a week to allow sufficient time for the account holder to receive the letter and take action. A system administrator can configure the follow-up date to automatically advance when certain call types are used. A user can also manually select the follow-up date. When a follow-up date is defined on the loan, the loan is not presented to be worked until that date.

A Follow-up Time can also be set on the loan. For example, an account holder may work until 3 pm. The user may want to set the follow-up time to 4 pm so they have a better chance of reaching the account holder. When a follow-up time is defined on the loan, the loan is not presented to be worked until that specific time.

Loans with follow-up times are presented to be worked in a user's queue before loans without follow up times, regardless of follow-up dates.

Automatic Follow-up Date Advancement

Most call types are configured by a system administrator to automatically advance the follow-up date on a loan.

To automatically advance the follow-up date, click on the Action tab to create a new follow-up note linked to the loan in context in the workspace. Select the desired Call Type Code from the Code drop-down and enter any text in the Details section of the Follow-up Detail window. Click Save.

Upon clicking Save, the follow-up date is automatically advanced to today plus the number of days specified by the system administrator in System Management > Collection > Call Types.

Manual Follow-up Date Advancement

To advance the follow-up date without using a call type, enter a date into the Date field on the Action tab or click the Date link to display a calendar from which to select a date.

Date Entering Shortcuts

Below are the ways a follow-up date can be manually entered into the Date field of the workspace Action tab:

Enter a period (.) and click out of the Date field to enter the current date.
Enter a date value (e.g. 15) and press Tab on the keyboard. This enters that date in the current month (e.g. 01/21/15). This date could be in the past.
Enter the month and date (e.g. 0115) and press Tab on the keyboard. This enters the specified month and date for the current year (e.g. 01/15/15). This date could be in the past.
Highlight the date in the field and press Page Up on the keyboard to enter the same date in the previous month.
Highlight the date in the field and press Page Down on the keyboard to enter the same date in the next month.

If a date is manually entered into the Date field and not selected from the calendar, it must be entered in the same format as defined by each user in User Preferences. If the date is not entered in the correct format, Elements tries to place the date in the correct format and the correct date may not be selected.

The length of time between the current date and the manually set follow-up date can be limited by the system administrator in System Management > Collection > Client Groups or Loan Groups or System Management > Users. To restrict setting follow-up date out too far in advance, the administrator can configure a warning or error message to display upon clicking Save after manually setting the follow-up date. If a warning message is received, the user is still able to save the new follow-up date. If an error message is received, the user is not able to save the new follow-up date.

Follow-up Time

In addition to the follow-up date, a specific follow-up time can be defined for the loan. To set the follow-up time, simply enter any time into the Time field on the Action tab of the workspace and click Save.

If no action is taken on the loan (no call type is selected or a follow-up date/time is not defined on the Action tab) and Next is clicked to move to the next account in the work queue, Elements automatically enters the default call back time defined by each user in User Preferences. The call back time is the current time plus the number of minutes defined in User Preferences. The loan is presented in the work queue again at that follow-up time.

If Next is clicked in the Search workspace, the follow-up time does not change.