Here at sa.global, we hear a lot of requirements around how a customer aging report needs to look.  In some instances, these requirements are driven by external parties (like a lender) that need a formal report in a certain prescribed way.  In many other instances, though, these reports are used internally by an AR department in order to help clerks identify and follow up on past due balances.

Customer aging report

In the first case, a static report like the “Customer aging” report could be used.  This report is found in “Credit and collections”–>”Inquiries and reports”–>”Customers”–>”Customer aging report”.  This report can be used to print out a static report for auditors or filing purposes.  In the second case, in order to drive the action of AR clerks, the collections form works best. Most users will overlook the collection forms saying “but we never send any of our customers to collections” or “I never send out collections letters or charge customers interest.”  While these tasks are possible using the collections form, they are not the only beneficial things on the form.  The collections form is also a great place to see customer balances, trace them through AX, and then follow up as needed.

Aging periods

Before we talk in detail about the options, aging buckets need to be created.  The buckets are created in “Credit and collections”–>”Setup”–>”Aging period definitions.”

Customer aging report parameters

Customer aging report parameters

As seen in the above screenshot, the Contoso virtual machine has a set of buckets for demonstration purposes already created.  This definition is used to create the date buckets that drive which columns appear on the certain reports and forms. The above data set creates 6 different bucket; Not due, Current, 30 days, 60 days, 90 days, and 180 and over.  Each of these periods are compared relatively to the subsequent periods.  For example, the “30 days” period includes all balances that are from 0-30 days past current.  For a detailed description of how to set the periods up, please head to the following TechNet article: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/dynamicsax-2012/aging-period-definitions-form Once the aging period definitions are created, they can be used in either the “Customer aging” report or the “Collections” form. When opening the customer aging report, a number of parameters are available in the report dialog.  These parameters can be examined in further detail by accessing the following TechNet article: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/dynamics365/finance/accounts-receivable/customer-aging In the following dialog, you can see I’ve chosen the “30_60_90_180” day period definition and told the report to run based on the due date. Running the report with these parameters selected yields the following result:
Customer aging report

Customer aging report

While this report is fine for static reporting and regulatory purposes, it does not really help users act on these balances.

Aged balances form

Aged balances form

Aged balances form

The Aged balances form is a great place for AR clerks to find and act on customer balances.  To access the collection form, navigate to “Credit and collections”–>”Collections”–>”Aged balances”. While this form looks very similar to the “Customer aging” report, accessing the information from this form allows users to access important parts of AX with a single-click.  For example, let’s say Birch Company’s balance is concerning.  From this form, the user can click the “Transactions” button and see the transactions that make up the balance.  If the AR clerk wants to follow up with the customer, they can quickly expand the “contact” factbox and quickly see the contact person’s phone number.

Updating balances

It’s important to understand this form acts on a snapshot of open transactions.  When the form is opened, if you want to see the current balance, you must click the “update aging” button in the ribbon bar.  This will update the balance on the particular customer you have selected. If you want to update all customer balances, you can process or batch the periodic job found in “Credit and collections”–>”Collections”–>”Age customer balances”.  Periodically running this job will keep the bulk of the records updated, though a user should till perform the manual “update aging” when accessing the record to make sure they have the most up-to-date information.

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