NSW Finance - Payments made via the Hero App

Note:  This article is for the benefit of schools in New South Wales only.

In Hero, Statements can be either viewed or printed. Viewing statements is the preferred option for these reasons:

• Viewing access rights are set based on a single caregiver for a single student providing greater flexibility for blended families. e.g.  a caregiver may be able to view the finances of one child in a family but not another.
• Caregivers can always view the full statement so can easily check historical payments made.
• Caregivers can see full payment details removing the need for receipt requests.
• Caregivers can pay line items instantly using the Customer Payment Platform (CPP).
• Finance Officers do not have to print statements.
• Payments are often more frequent as finance viewing is always available.

The access to view finances is caregiver/student specific and is managed separately from the access to view student learning. This means that a caregiver may be able to view student learning for a particular student but not view finances and visa versa. It also means that a caregiver can have access to view the finances for one child in a family but not another. This is particularly useful in blended family situations where students with different secondary caregivers are linked as siblings. The caregiver will only see the student on a family statement that they have access to see.

ENABLING FINANCE VIEWING FOR CAREGIVERS

Before a caregiver can view finances online, their access to view needs to be enabled. This is part of a student's finance Account Settings. Refer to Managing Statement Recipients for details on how to set access.

Once a caregiver has finance access enabled, their name is available for selection, by the Finance Officer, to receive emails and app notifications when statements have been updated.  

WHAT PARENTS CAN SEE

When a caregiver logs into Hero, they will be presented with the Caregiver Menu. The Student Billing icon will only exist if the school has enabled caregiver viewing in the Finance Options. 

If the above slider is turned on, but an individual caregiver does not have finance access enabled, the icon will still show but an error screen will be displayed on click, prompting the caregiver to contact the school for support.

A red ! will indicate to the caregiver that unpaid line items exist.  A green tick is an indicate that the account is fully settled.

The caregiver app offers a user-friendly and mobile-friendly view.  They will see the same details as the school Finance Officer, with the exclusion of any line item that is fully Voided or Written off.   On entry, they will see summary of the debit and credit balances for the entire family with the option to quickly pay all unpaid items.

Scrolling down will enable them to view and select individual line items per student.  The selection displayed will default to UNPAID LINE ITEMS, but a caregiver may choose to view the full statement or the current year only.

Clicking the Line Item name will reveal the payments or other credit transactions applied against that line item.

PAYING LINE ITEMS ONLINE

The NSW DoE uses the Customer Payment Platform (CPP) to allow caregivers to pay their accounts using Debit or Credit Card. 

Line Items paid using this method will automatically update the Line Item in Hero with an 'ONLINE' payment type so no additional keying is required by the Finance Officer.

1.  To pay online, the caregiver clicks the slider on each line item they wish to pay followed by PAY SELECTED ITEMS.  The amount being paid can be adjusted in the next step.

2.  The caregiver is able to adjust the amount they wish to pay.  Click Pay <amount> now.

3.  The DoE payment processing screen will be displayed.  Enter the card details to be used for the payment and click Validate card

4. A Payment Summary will be displayed.  Click Pay Now to proceed with the payment.

5.  Once processed, the caregiver will be returned to the Finance page.  Any issues with the process will cause the payment to back out and the caregiver will not be charged.