Uploading your fees and leases, step by step

This article walks you through the bulk upload wizard from start to finish, from opening it to a completed import. It is for anyone at the property who uploads a spreadsheet to create or update fees (or rent) and leases for many units at once.

The wizard has six steps: Upload, Units, Payer, Review, Launch settings, and Commit. This article covers all six, in order, so you know how far you have to go. If you upload bank details only, the batch skips the Units and Payer steps. The Units and Payer steps are covered in full in Matching units and choosing who pays, and the bank debit parts of the Review step are covered in full in Bank debit agreements. This article gives you a short version of those two areas and points you to where the detail lives.

Before you start

You find this wizard in Property Settings, in the drawer where you manage units. That drawer has two tabs. Open the tab named Bulk Actions.

At the top of Bulk Actions is a block called "Fees and bank debit". It holds two cards.

1. The first card starts the upload described in this article. Its button is named after your property's own wording, for example Upload fees and leases.
2. The second card, "Bank debit agreements", opens the same wizard with Bank details only already chosen on the Upload step. Use it when the fees for those units already run and you only need to add bank details.

The first card's button only becomes clickable once all of the following are true. If it is greyed out, a small line under it tells you why:

• At least one unit at the property already has people living there or owning it. If not, you see "Add residents to at least one unit first".
• Accounting is switched on for the property, and the property is on a plan that supports it. If not, you see "Turn on accounting for this property first".
• You hold at least one of the permissions to post journal entries, manage leases, or manage payments. If not, you see "Ask a property administrator".

While the property checks whether you can use this wizard, the button shows a grey placeholder. If that check itself fails, you see "Could not check eligibility for this property" with a Retry button.

Press the button to open the wizard.

The step rail at the top of the wizard, showing all six steps.

Step 1: Upload

On this step you choose what you are uploading and then pick your spreadsheet. The question "What are you uploading?" offers three choices: Fees only, Bank details only and Both. With Both, you upload the fees file here and add the bank details file later, on the Review step. With Fees only, there is no bank step. Bank details only is for units whose fees already run.

1. Drag your file onto the drop area, or click it (or press Enter or Space while it is focused) to open your file picker. The area reads "Drag & drop your CSV file here or browse files", and accepts ".csv files up to 50 MB".
2. If you are not sure what columns your file needs, read the "CSV field guide" panel above the drop area. It lists every column the wizard understands: unit_label is required, payer_name is optional (leave it blank to use the unit's current payer), occupant_email is optional but is the strongest way to be sure who a row's payer is, and the fee amount and lease detail columns are listed alongside anything the wizard will not use.
3. If you do not already have a spreadsheet, press the button to download a ready-made template. It comes filled in with this property's own unit list.
4. Once you pick a file, it appears as a small chip. Press Choose different file if you picked the wrong one.
5. If a column in your file was not recognized automatically, a small table appears letting you point it at the right field by hand. Most files need no changes here.

Nothing is written to the property yet. As the wizard itself says: "Upload a CSV to create or update monthly fee and lease records in bulk. Nothing is written until you commit at the end of this wizard."

The Continue button at the bottom of the wizard stays greyed out until a file is uploaded and the unit_label column is matched. While it is greyed out, it reads "Continue enables once a file is uploaded".

If your file cannot be used, you see a plain message telling you why, for example:

• "This file could not be read into usable rows. Add at least one populated row and upload it again." (your file only had a header row, with no data underneath)
• "This file is missing the required Unit column." (or Lease type, Start date, or Billing day, whichever column the wizard could not find)

The file drop area on the Upload step, before a file is chosen.

Step 2: Units

On this step, the wizard checks that the unit number in each row of your file really matches a unit at the property, and asks you to confirm any it is not completely sure about.

This is covered in full, including what each row tag means and what to do about a frozen billing account or an open transfer, in Matching units and choosing who pays. In short: confirm or choose a unit for every row that needs it, or skip the row. The Continue button stays greyed out until every row is resolved one way or the other, and reads "Continue enables once every source unit is resolved" while it waits.

Step 3: Payer

On this step, you choose who the fee or lease should be billed to on each unit.

This is also covered in full in Matching units and choosing who pays, including who cannot be chosen as a payer and what inviting a new person actually does. In short: the step lists only the rows that need a person. A row whose email matches exactly, or that uses the unit's current payer because payer_name was left blank, resolves itself and sits under "Matched". For the rows the wizard could not match with confidence, you choose to invite a new person or pick someone already on the unit. The Continue button stays greyed out until every row that is not skipped has a payer decision, and reads "Continue enables once every resident decision is made" while it waits.

Step 4: Review

This step shows you everything that will happen if you commit, before you commit it. Nothing is written to the property yet, and nobody has been emailed. As the wizard itself says: "Nothing is written until you commit. Check what will import, what carries a warning, and what will be skipped."

If your batch collects bank debit details, three extra blocks appear above the fee review: a readiness check for the property, an area to upload a file of bank account details, and a list of the bank debit agreements the batch will create, together with any conflicts that need your attention. These three blocks are covered in full in Bank debit agreements. Fee rows are never held up by anything in these three blocks: even if bank debit setup cannot proceed for some reason, your leases and fees still commit.

The fee review itself always appears, whether or not your batch collects bank debit details. Four tiles summarize your file:

• Total rows: staged from your file.
• Ready: will import when you commit.
• Warnings: rows resolved with a choice you made.
• Skipped: will not import.

Below the tiles, a table lists only the rows that need your attention: Row, Unit, Resident, Issue, and Status.

1. If a unit already has an active lease, that row shows two buttons, Update and Refuse. Choosing Update shows exactly what will change: "Changes the monthly fee from $X to $Y from . Resident, dates, and past invoices are unchanged." Choosing Refuse shows "Refused lease update, row will be skipped. The current active lease stays exactly as it is." If several units already have an active lease, Apply to all lets you answer Update or Refuse once for all of them, and you can still change any single row afterwards.
2. Rows on a unit with an open transfer cannot be changed here. They are shown read-only with "N rows will be skipped: unit has an open transfer."
3. Rows with an unresolved error carry a checkbox: "Skip N rows with an unresolved error and continue with the other M." Tick it to let the rest of the batch continue.

The Continue button stays greyed out until every collision above has an Update or Refuse choice, and every error row is ticked to skip. While it waits, it reads "Continue enables once every collision has a choice and every error row is skipped".

Step 5: Launch settings

On this step you set when the money starts and when people are told about it.

1. Set the fee start date. This is the date every new or changed fee takes effect. If your batch has bank debit rows that people will sign, this date and the communication date below must be at least 10 days apart. A fees-only batch has no 10-day rule.

2. Choose a start period mode:

   • Charge the first period on the start date: the charge on your start date covers the full billing period, even if the date falls partway through it.
   • Start at the next billing date: skip the partial period, and the first charge lands on the next full billing date instead.

   Fees are never charged on a pro-rated, partial-period basis, and you cannot backdate a start from this screen.

3. Set the communication date. This field stays disabled until you set a start date ("Choose the fee start date first."). It cannot be before today. If your batch includes bank debit rows that people will sign, this date cannot fall later than 10 days before the fee start date, and it defaults to exactly that day. If your fee start date is already less than 10 days away, this field is blocked entirely, with "Bank debit messages must go out at least 10 days before the fee start date. Move the fee start date to send them."

4. Decide whether to turn on Send set-up invitations. This sends an email to anyone in the batch with no bank debit row, so they can set up their own fee payment on their own. It is on by default when the property can accept bank debits, and off and unchangeable otherwise, with "Off because this property cannot accept bank debits yet. No bank account is connected for collections."

5. If your batch has any bank debit rows, choose how people will agree to bank debits. This is covered in full in Bank debit agreements. You choose this once for the whole batch, not row by row. Once you add a bank details file on the Review step, this choice appears here straight away.

If you already hold signed paper agreements. Choose "I already hold signed agreements (staff declaration)" instead of sending each person the agreement to sign. A "Signed paper agreements" card then asks for the date residents were told (the notice date, today or earlier) and the first debit date, and you confirm by typing your full name. There must be at least 10 days between the notice date and the first debit date, and the first debit date must be a Canadian business day. For this kind of batch, the start period choice and the communication date are hidden, and the fee start date is set to the first debit date. Each resident gets one setup email automatically when the import commits.

If your batch has no bank debit rows, the 10-day rule does not apply, and a fee can start within 10 days of the communication date. If you upload bank details only, this step shows only the bank debit agreement choice and the Send set-up invitations switch. Fees already running for those units are not changed.

If you already sent messages for this batch and you now change the fee start date, a confirmation appears warning you that messages already sent cannot be recalled, and that dates shown in the app may now differ from what people were emailed. You can choose to change the date anyway or keep the current one.

Once every required field is set, press Continue. This is the step that both saves your settings and commits the batch: while it works, the button reads "Saving...". If you are reopening a batch that already committed, from the Send card, this button instead reads Save, and saving closes the wizard without committing again.

Step 6: Commit

This is where your leases, billing accounts, and charge schedules are actually created. It runs in the background.

1. While it runs, you see a progress indicator and the line "Import running in the background".
2. Press Navigate away safely at any point. This closes the drawer. The import keeps running on the server, so you do not need to keep the drawer open, and nothing is lost by closing it.
3. If you reopen the batch while it is still running, you see "You reopened this batch. It kept committing while the drawer was closed."
4. If your browser closes unexpectedly while a commit is running, for example a crash, an accidental tab close, or your computer going to sleep, nothing is lost. When you come back, you see: "Your browser closed unexpectedly. Nothing was lost, and nothing committed twice; the batch picked up from row N."

When the commit finishes, you see a tick and "Import complete", with "Your leases have been created and residents notified." Four tiles summarize the result:

• Leases created or updated: the number of leases (or owner-fee records) this batch created or changed.
• Billing accounts created: the number of new billing accounts set up for units that did not already have one.
• Charge schedules created: the number of recurring fee schedules now in place.
• Rows skipped or failed: rows that did not import, whether by your own choice or because of an error.

The four result tiles shown after a finished import.

If any rows failed, two buttons appear:

• Download error report: saves a file listing exactly which rows failed and why, in plain language.
• Retry failed rows: re-runs only the rows that failed, without touching the rows that already succeeded. Nothing that already imported is imported twice.

If some bank debit rows could not be processed because you personally lack the payments permission, you see "N bank debit rows were not processed because you do not have the payments permission. The rest of the upload was still processed." The fee rows in the same batch are unaffected.

Below the result tiles, the same bank debit agreement list from the Review step appears again, this time read only. There is nothing left to confirm or upload here.

Nothing is saved until Commit, and messages wait for Send

It is worth stating plainly, because it matters for money and for your residents: every step from Upload through Launch settings only stages your data. Nothing is written to a unit's lease, billing account, or fee schedule until you reach Commit and it finishes successfully.

And even after Commit, for a normal batch nobody receives an email. Sending is a separate action, done afterwards from the "Fee and bank debit batch" card (the Send card) that appears on the Bulk Actions tab once you close the wizard. You choose when those messages go out, and you can review the batch as many times as you like before you decide to send anything.

There is one exception. If you declared that you hold signed paper agreements, Commit also bills the first debit and sends each resident one setup email automatically, with no wait for Send. No invoice email goes out for that first bill. Nothing else in the batch is sent until you press Send.

Related articles

• Matching units and choosing who pays
• Bank debit agreements