Automatic payment and bank details

What Automatic payment does

Automatic payment lets URBI pay a vendor bill without a manual "Pay this bill" step. The control lives directly on an existing bill's side panel, not only in the Create Expense drawer, so any staff member who can open the bill can see it and change it.

Turning it on or off

1. Open the bill and find Automatic payment in the side panel.
2. With the toggle off, the panel reads:

3. Turn the toggle on. A segmented control appears with two choices.

• On Approval help text: "Pay immediately when final approval completes."
• On Date shows a date field, with help text: "Pay on a specific date, fires at 09:00 UTC."

How URBI decides the payment route

Automatic payment does not ask you to pick a rail. The pop-up on the toggle says it plainly: "Decided by URBI. URBI picks the route from the bank details on file." URBI reads the paying route stored for the property and the bank details on file for the vendor, and sends the payment accordingly. There is nothing to configure per bill.

If the scheduled date arrives before the bill is approved

If a scheduled date arrives while the bill is still unapproved, nothing is paid. A warning appears on the bill:

The next approver and the person who raised the bill are both warned. Nothing about the bill or its schedule is changed. Once the remaining approval clears, Automatic payment fires as scheduled, no re-arming needed.

Bank details belong to the vendor, not the bill

Bank details now belong to the contractor company itself, as one shared set that every payment path reads, not something entered per bill. The contractor enters them in the vendor portal, reached by a link. There are two equally valid routes:

Typing the details in by hand shows a warning naming both risks before the contractor can save:

Details entered by hand are saved and marked unverified. A connected bank account is not.

What staff can see

No staff member ever sees an account number or routing number, at any permission level. Staff see only an on-file or not-on-file marker, plus an unverified flag when the details were typed by hand.

When Automatic payment can't be armed

Automatic payment cannot be armed on a bill whose payment is already released or in flight. URBI refuses the toggle in that state. If a payment already went out or is on its way, turning Automatic payment on would not change anything about that payment; it is refused so nothing looks armed that can't actually fire.

What happens when a payment cannot be completed

Payments can fail after they are sent, for example because of insufficient funds, an invalid account number, or a closed account. URBI handles each case differently.

Insufficient funds

• URBI retries the payment automatically once, after a short delay.
• If the retry also fails, the bill returns to Approved status and its Automatic payment status shows Failed.
• You are notified by email. You can wait for the vendor to resolve their account, or release the payment manually through Pay this bill.

Invalid or changed account (requires re-linking)

• URBI immediately sends the contractor a new bank-details invitation.
• The bill returns to Approved status and waits.
• Once the contractor updates their bank details, you can re-arm Automatic payment or release the payment manually.
• The Activity tab on the bill shows a Relink Requested event.

Unauthorized return (account frozen)

• If the bank reports an unauthorized return, the contractor's bank details are frozen in the system. No further automatic payments are sent to that account.
• An administrator must manually resolve the vendor record before payments can resume.
• The Activity tab shows a Payee Frozen event.

Checking status via the Activity tab

Open any bill and click the Activity tab to see a full timeline of Automatic payment events, including when payment was scheduled, when it was initiated, and whether it succeeded or failed.