Payment Plans - An Overview

Revela offers Payment Plan Presets that allow tenants to pay a charge in installments rather than all at once. This is especially useful in scenarios such as a tenant catching up on a past-due balance or breaking out a large invoice across several payments. This guide walks through creating a payment preset (which can be used across your entire portfolio), choosing the right plan type, controlling who can enroll, and marking invoices eligible for the plan.

Creating a Payment Plan Preset

To begin, navigate to Set Up > Configurations > Payment Plans and select New Payment Plan Preset.

• Enter a Name and Description for the plan. The description is tenant-facing - it's what a resident will see when choosing a payment plan in their portal, so it's worth writing it in plain language rather than internal shorthand.
• Set the Enrollment Availability. This controls the window during which tenants can start enrolling in the plan - it does not affect the payment schedule itself, only when someone is allowed to join it. Set start and end dates for when the plan can be joined. Leaving this blank keeps the plan open indefinitely, until it's manually modified or deleted, so it's worth setting an end date for anything meant to be temporary (like a one-time hardship plan) to avoid it staying active longer than intended.

• Allowing tenants to self-enroll - Select Available in Tenant Portal to let tenants enroll themselves without staff involvement. Leaving this unchecked means only employees can enroll a tenant, which is useful if plans are meant to be offered case-by-case rather than opt-in.

Selecting a Payment Plan Type

Revela offers three plan types, and the right one depends on whether you need fixed calendar dates or a schedule that flexes around when the tenant actually signs up.

Explicit Installments

• This payment plan type sets specific installment dates, and the total amount on the charge is divided evenly across them. When the amount doesn't divide evenly, Revela adjusts by a cent to account for the remainder. For example, a $1,000 charge split across 3 installments is calculated as $333.33, $333.32, and $333.33.

Note:

• If a tenant enrolls late, the amount owed is redistributed evenly across the remaining installment dates rather than the original full set - the plan recalculates around whatever is left.
• Enrolling on the same day as a scheduled installment skips that installment; a tenant must enroll at least one day before an installment date for it to count. In practice, this means late sign-ups should be communicated with a heads-up that the first payment may be larger than expected.
• Example: A tenant who joins a three-installment plan after the first installment date has passed will have the total split across the remaining two payments instead of three.

Date Range Installments

• This payment plan type sets a start and end date along with a minimum and maximum number of installments, and Revela spaces payments evenly across that window.

Note:

• A late enrollment starts the tenant's first payment the next day, with the remaining payments spaced evenly through what's left of the date range - the schedule compresses to fit, rather than starting the count over.
• Example: A 90-day range with three installments enrolled partway through will still schedule three payments, just spaced evenly across whatever time remains rather than the full 90 days.

Duration-Based Installments

• This payment plan type sets a total plan duration and a number of installments; the first payment always begins the next day, and the plan runs for the specified number of days from there.
• Example: A 90-day plan with three installments breaks down as:
• Installment 1 - Day 1
• Installment 2 - Day 30 (90 ÷ 3)
• Installment 3 - Day 60

Because each type calculates dates and amounts differently once a tenant enrolls late, it's worth matching the type to how much flexibility you actually want to offer. Explicit Installments for fixed, calendar-driven due dates; Date Range or Duration-Based when the schedule should adapt more to when someone signs up.

Enabling Invoices for a Payment Plan

Please note that an invoice isn't automatically eligible for a payment plan just because a preset exists. Rather, it has to be marked eligible individually for a payment plan. You can do this in one of two ways:

1. Select the Eligible for Payment Plans checkbox when invoicing from the Agreements page, as shown below:

1. Or edit an existing receivable invoice billed to a tenant and enable the same setting there, as shown below:

Either method has the same effect - until an invoice is flagged this way, tenants won't see it as an option to enroll in a payment plan, even if a preset is active.

• Decide on tenant self-enrollment before publishing a preset - this determines whether tenants see it in their portal at all, versus only being enrolled manually by staff.
• If you leave the Enrollment Availability Window blank, remember the plan stays open indefinitely. For anything meant to be short-term (like a one-time hardship arrangement), set an end date so it doesn't remain active longer than intended.
• For Explicit Installment plans, proactively tell late-enrolling tenants that their first payment may be larger than expected, since the remaining balance is redistributed across fewer installments - this avoids confusion when the amount doesn't match the original schedule.
• Confirm an invoice is marked Eligible for Payment Plans before advertising the plan to a tenant - a preset being active doesn't automatically make every invoice enrollable.

Tenants Enrolling in a Payment Plan

Revela allows tenants to enroll in a payment plan directly from their portal, giving them a self-service way to spread a charge across multiple payments without needing to contact their property manager.

Within a tenant portal, a user can set up a new payment plan by following the steps below:

1. Open the Charges tab
2. Click Setup Payment Plan in the upper right.
3. Select the plan to enroll in, set the number of installments (if available), and select a payment method.

Note: This option will only become available when a payment plan preset has been created and activated, and the invoice in question has been marked as Eligible for Payment Plans (see Setting Up a Payment Plan Preset).

If a tenant sees an error stating that no invoice is available, it is worth checking with the property management company or fraternal organization first to confirm the payment plan and invoice eligibility before assuming there is an issue with the account.

Removing a Payment Plan

If a tenant wants to cancel a payment plan they're already enrolled in, they can do so from Dashboard > View Payment Plan > Terminate. This ends the plan going forward.

Switching the payment method on an active plan is a two-step process, since the new method has to exist on the account before it can be applied to the plan itself:

1. Add the new payment method first, via Payment Method > Add Payment Method.
2. Then update the plan to use it, via Dashboard > View Payment Plan > Edit, and select the new payment method.

If a tenant would rather pay off the remaining balance in one lump sum instead of continuing with scheduled installments, the payment plan needs to be canceled first — a plan and a one-time payment can't run against the same balance at the same time.

1. Go to View Payment Plan and select Terminate.
2. Once the plan has been terminated, click Make a Payment to pay the remaining balance in full.

If one or more installments in an active payment plan fail, the tenant receives an email notifying them of the failure, along with a link to schedule a later payment for that installment.

Tenants who would rather not troubleshoot a failed installment can instead cancel the plan and pay the remaining balance in full (see Paying the Full Balance with an Active Payment Plan above).

There's currently no way to edit specific installment dates on an existing plan if there was a failed scheduled payment. If the payment plan schedule needs to change, a tenant has two options: cancel the current plan and enroll in a new one with the desired dates, or reach out to their property manager or organization administrator for assistance as Revela does not have the ability to alter the cadence of the payment plan.

• If a tenant reports they don't see the option to enroll in a payment plan, confirm two things before troubleshooting further: that a payment plan preset is active, and that the specific invoice has been marked eligible for payment plans. Both are required for the enrollment option to appear.
• When helping a tenant switch payment methods, make sure the new method is added to their account first - trying to select a method on the plan before it exists on the account won't work.
• Encourage tenants to review their installment schedule and payment method before enrolling. Since payment plans are tied to a specific invoice and method at setup, catching a mistake before enrollment is simpler than correcting it afterward.