Pay-to contacts on merged payment requests

Pay bills provides two options for merging vendor payments. These options treat the Pay-to contact information differently.

Understanding the differences between the two options will help you create payment requests with the Pay-to information you expect. This is especially true when you are paying bills that have different Pay-to contacts defined.

How bills can have different Pay-to contacts

Pay-to contact information differ between bills, or between bills and the vendor record, in the following situations:

  • You override the default Pay-to contact during bill entry.
    For example, say you enter a bill that is for a vendor location that uses a different Pay-to contact than the one specified on the vendor record. To make sure that the payment is sent to the right place, you select a different Pay-to contact on the bill.
  • You edit the Pay-to contact in the vendor record.
    For example, say the Print as name changes for the vendor Pay-to contact. You update the vendor record to edit Print as. All bills created after that point default to the updated Pay-to contact. Bills entered before you updated the vendor record use the old contact information.

How to select a merge payment option

When you pay bills, the Payment request method you select determines whether the payment request will take the pay-to contact information from the bill or from the vendor record.

In many cases, you might want to use the Pay-to contact information from the bill, to ensure that the payment is sent to the correct contact. In some cases, you might want to override the contact information on the bill to update the payment with the latest information, or to enforce your internal policies.

Option Description Sample use case
Merge payment requests into one per vendor pay-to contact Uses the Pay-to contact information from the bill. Your vendor has different locations and a single vendor record. When you enter bills, you override the Pay-to contact to select the right contact for the location that you used. When paying the bills, you want to send one check to each location.
Merge requests into one per vendor Uses the Pay-to contact information from the vendor record. Your vendor recently moved. You already updated the Pay-to contact on the vendor record. You want to merge all payments for the vendor and you want to make sure that payment is sent to the new address only.
Not interested in merging payments, but still want control over which Pay-to contact is used to create the payment? Generate one request per bill always uses Pay-to contact information from the bill. Use vendor preference always uses Pay-to contact information from the vendor record, but this option might merge payments. Check the vendor record to see if Merge payment requests is selected on the Payment information tab.