assesment fee collection

Started by MichaelJ8 • 8 replies • 1401 views

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MichaelJ8 (Illinois)
Posts: 113

Posted:

We are a small condo association. There are 14 oweners, 20 more in the future. How do most treasures collect the money? Do they mail it to you, bring it to you or what? Any suggestions would be most apprecative. Thanks

PetunkaM (Florida)
Posts: 1,009

Posted:

I do pray you are not the Treasurer. And, I mean it.

MichaelJ8 (Illinois)
Posts: 113

Posted:

I am the treasure and I am trying to learn. That remark did not help any

MelissaP1 (Alabama)
Posts: 13,836

Posted:

Our HOA had a collections box located at the collective mailboxes. It was well known we were an HOA and people knew where the drop off box was located. However, some HOA's don't have that option. You can't put anything in a mailbox without a stamp on it. So if your considering mailing notifications or pay coupons, you have to add that expense into the mix.

I think the best way to collect is the best way to collect for your HOA. Each one is different. Just make sure you do NO CASH payments. You can allow for automatic withdraw with some banks so owners can pay that way. Just make sure people are aware they are in a HOA and what the fees/schedule of payments are.

Former HOA President

TimB4 (Tennessee)
Posts: 21,059

Posted:

We send a payment book once a year (similar to a car payment book). The owner pulls off a sheet, makes out a check and either delivers it to the Treasurer (or bookkeeper) or mails it to our PO box.

The payment book is easily made using any word processor program.

Tim

JohnM48 (Pennsylvania)
Posts: 89

Posted:

Similar to Tim, we print coupon books and deliver them to the homeowners. We have a community building with a drop box. Most people simply drop the payments in the box, a few mail the payment or come by during our office hours.

Association President

LarryB13 (Arizona)
Posts: 4,099

Posted:

We found that anything you do to make paying assessments easier will decrease your deliquencies.

Writing a check from a personal account is getting to be a thing of the past. You might want to encourage members to use their bank's bill pay service as they can schedule the payment to be made automatically. If your association was larger I would recommend setting up online payments from credit cards.

TimB4 (Tennessee)
Posts: 21,059

Posted:

Quote:

Posted By LarryB13 on 08/06/2011 5:32 PM
You might want to encourage members to use their bank's bill pay service as they can schedule the payment to be made automatically.

We have a lot of members (25 out of 130)who use their banks bill pay system. They seem to like it.

JohnM48 (Pennsylvania)
Posts: 89

Posted:

Quote:

Posted By LarryB13 on 08/06/2011 5:32 PM
We found that anything you do to make paying assessments easier will decrease your deliquencies.

This is (almost) universally true in business. Many years ago my business was experiencing average collection times ranging from 6 - 12 weeks (depending on the services provided). Simply by printing our invoices on perforated paper so there was a tear-off payment coupon and providing a self-addressed return envelope we cut our collection times to 2 - 4 weeks.

Association President

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