Functional Overview

The Incoming Payments API allows Customers, or Agents using a partnership model, to submit incoming receivables for collection in one of the supported payment methods and currencies.
Basic features of the API include the creation of FX quotes, submission of incoming receivable orders, transactional
reporting, and retrieval of supported payment methods, currencies, and instructions.
There are three basic XML API flows supported; deciding on a specific flow should be dependent on the intended use case, FX requirement, and Customer or Agent model. Certain API calls are not available for all flows.

Receivables can be booked in one of the following Incoming API flows¹:
Option 1: Customer Model - Quoted with same or different trade and settlement currencies.
Option 2: Customer Model – Unquoted with same or different trade and settlement currencies.
Option 3: Agent Model - Using same or different trade and settlement currencies for Agent Clients.

Consider each persona below to identify that which most closely resembles your business needs.

Option 1 - Customer Model 1:

As a Convera Client or Partner, I want my Payers to quote and log single receivables.
A Payer may abandon their quote without completing their payment.
The Payer is responsible for paying all FX conversion charges and/or transaction fees associated with the payment.
As a Client/Partner I want these charges to be incorporated into the final amount my Payer is quoted.
As the Client, I do not need the ability to amend or cancel an order once it has been posted.
As the Client, I want to pull reports on order status, disbursed items, and reconciliation.

Option 2 - Customer Model 2:

As a Convera Client or Partner, I want my Payers to log single receivables, and I want the ability to edit or cancel an order.
I (the Client/Partner) will pay any conversion rate and fees associated with the payment upon receipt of funds and
this will be deducted from the incoming settlement I will receive from Convera.
As the Client, I also want to pull reports on order status, disbursed items, and reconciliation.

Option 3 – Agent/Partner Model:

As a Convera Partner/Bank, I want to log receivables on behalf of my Customers or affiliates through a Convera
interface, wherein all University and/or Region required fields for a given Customer’s payment are automatically
presented and sent with the payment.
I do not need the ability to edit or cancel a payment once it has been posted.
I want to receive reports on all payments via a scheduled report.

What is a Receivable? A receivable is created any time money is owed to a firm for services rendered or products provided that have not yet been paid. In the instance of Convera, a receivable is created when a Payer agrees to send money to their university or bank, using Convera as the intermediary for that process. A receivable itself is not an invoice, but rather the creation of a transaction that is expected to satisfy an invoice.

What happens to Receivables? Once a receivable is created, it sits in “Awaiting Payment” status until the funds meant to satisfy the receivable have been received. At that point, the payment is then sent on to the ultimate recipient (the University or Bank) to fulfill the requirements of the initial invoice.

Some common statuses for receivables are listed below:

Awaiting Payment: When the pledge is booked on the Buyer Portal.
Overdue: Only appears when and if the payment has not been received within 72-hour period after the pledge was booked. Then if payment is still not received it will update to Expired.
Expired: Appears if Convera has not received a payment from a student for 10 days or more.
Awaiting Review: Appears when Convera has received payment from the remitter and either the amount is
outside of tolerance, or if payment was received outside of the 72-hour threshold.
Posted: Appears after a payment has been booked.
Cleared: Appears after an outgoing payment has been sent to a University or Bank.

Additionally, each of these models can be supplemented with our Real-Time Outbound Status API (Webhooks):
The Webhooks functionality creates a configurable outbound status update API for all incoming transactions. This
communicates the latest status changes of transactions from Convera initiated from the Incoming Payments API. The definition of outbound call is configurable as per a Partner/Client’s API specification. A Client or Agent can choose to subscribe to a set of statuses they wish to be notified on. The Partner service will then be invoked only if it subscribes to a specific status change. See Webhooks Overview.

¹Options are subject to availability based on the agreed funds flow between Client/Partner and Convera