Margill Loan Manager: Is there a way for me to see if users are logged on to the system?
Question: Is there a way for me to see if users are logged on to the system?
Answer:
Go to Tools > Users and see this:
A borrower missed a payment last month. This month he doubles up his payment to compensate. Doubling should get him back on track but I get a higher balance at the end of the loan? Help!
Question: A borrower missed a payment last month. This month he doubles up his payment to compensate. Doubling should get him back on track but I get a higher balance at the end of the loan? Help!
Answer: Your borrower will be CLOSE to back on track but there was accrued interest for the month he missed so this is why you are not back to the same end balance (0.00).
To get the exact payment that should have been paid to compensate, he will have to pay the outstanding interest. An easy way to get the exact payment is to highlight that payment line, right click and do this:
Can I apply a payment only to principal even if there is outstanding interest?
Question: Can I apply a payment only to principal even if there is outstanding interest?
Answer:
Yes when this advanced feature is activated. In the Trial version, this is not activated by default since a more advanced feature.
To activate, go to Tools > Settings > User Settings > “Options: Interest-only and Fixed Principal” (blue link). The third option will allow you to pay principal first. You can set this as your default or have Margill give you the three options when you are in a loan. I would check “Offer the three option when creating a loan” for maximum flexibility.
Go back to your loan. Go on the payment that is to pay principal only. Right click with the mouse:
This window will appear allowing you to enter the amount of principal to pay back. I wish to pay $1000 in principal in this example:
This window will appear allowing to choose the third option that will pay back principal before paying any outstanding interest. Notice we write “NOT SUGGESTED”. We wrote this because it is not a standard refund order but we will be taking this off since we see in practice that this is in fact used quite often, particularly in inter-company loans.
Now you will see that this payment ($1000) pays principal even if there is outstanding interest.
New “Paid Principal” Line status in version 5.0 of Margill Loan Manager!
The “Paid Principal” Line status will, at the time of payment pay principal (and corresponding APR Fees financed, case being) before paying outstanding interest.
You cannot though, create a schedule with Paid Principal if there are Due Pmt lines before. You would have to use the method explained above (right mouse click > Payments > Fixed Principal Payment).
Can Loan Manager be used to collect invoices with payments here an there? Each invoice only starts accruing interest after 30 days.
Q: Can Loan Manager be used to collect invoices with payments here an there? Each invoice only starts accruing interest after 30 days.
We are a medium-sized law firm and send out invoices to our clients irregularly. Many of our clients do not pay within the 30 days allotted (invoices are Net 30 days otherwise the monthly interest is 1% per month (12% annually)). We charge simple interest, not compound.
Example:
- First invoice: Dec. 1 2016 for $2950.00
- Second invoice: Jan 4, 2017 for $4381.25
- Third invoice: Nov. 6, 2017 for $5000.00
- Payment was made Jan 26, 2017 for $1000.00
- We are now November 7, 2017 and the assistant must easily see how much is due today or any day.
A. This is done easily but a little thinking must go into it. Below will show you what has to be done…
In Margill Loan Manager, a Record must be created for each of your clients. Each Record will contain many invoice and (we hope) many payments. This is very similar to a line of credit with one exception, that interest starts accruing only 30 days after the invoice date. You will thus enter the invoice on the day it was sent BUT with a payment date 30 days (or one month) after the invoice date. So for the Dec. 1 invoice, the payment date will be Jan 1.
Click on File > New Record > Data
The Compounding Period is grayed out since in Advanced we changed to Simple interest
With an Irregular payment frequency, this window (optional) allows you to enter the invoices and payments quickly and these need not follow the chronological order in which invoice are sent and payments received. Any transaction entered in the window can be changed afterwards in the actual payment schedule.
Press on Save.
Now press on Compute to produce the payment schedule (called Payment Table in Margill). A comment could have added or can be added now in the Comment column (there is also a Check number column to the right that can be moved).
Fees can even be added in the Column Fees (Called “Admin – Accrued” below) which could be added above and beyond the interest on the invoices (we will not add any here).
I would first change the “Due Pmt” Line status to “Paid Pmt” since this was already paid. Notice “Add. Princ. (Loan)” – this is where each invoice is sent. These could be changed to a more user friendly name such as “Invoice” (you can rename many Line statuses – take “Add. Princ (2)” and rename as desired)).
I now wish to know how much is owed today Nov 7, 2017. This step is not required since the data is all computed an accessible directly in the Main window but for the sake of learning, let’s do it. We insert a line (right mouse click or 
). Change the date to today’s date. So this client owes the law firm $6937.95 + $5000 = $11937.95 but does not YET owe the $60.59 in accrued interest.
Now let’s get this information on to the Main window for very easy access.
I created an Equation in Margill that takes the balance today and adds the Principal (my invoices) that is added after today (so the 5000 billed yesterday but that will start bearing interest only 30 days from Nov 6).
We now see the “Total due (maybe should have been or “owed” not “due”) TODAY” that is the number we are looking for. The amount will increase tomorrow by $2.09 which is the daily interest on the interest bearing portion (not on the 5000 that only starts bearing interest on Dec. 6).
Here is the calculation for the daily interest on the proper amount:
If you are dealing with a large volume of transactions (invoices and payments) on a daily basis, you can mass import the invoices and payments manually for all your accounts in one window or through a very simple Excel sheet containing the account number, the date and the amount and whether the transaction is an invoice or payment. This is done in Tools > Post Payments > Bulk Payment Import > Import New Payments.
Example below of manual entry for multiple accounts at once.
Contact our Support for more information.
Margill Loan Manager – Features inquiry…
Is there a limit on the number of notes that can be tracked at one time?
Not really. The number of loans you can enter in the system is based on your license package. Our largest users have 30,000 loans, our smallest maybe 5? Price is based on number of loans and users.
Can the interest rates adjust as the Prime rate (or other) adjusts and payments recalculate automatically?
You can update all your loans at once with the Prime rate (or other). You can have interest-only payments recalculated. You cannot have P&I payments recalculated automatically although this feature could be added.
Can the system handle balloon payments?
Yes
Terms of the notes can be different? Interest rates fixed vs variable, length of loan
Yes
Types of reports available?
You create your own with over 1000 fields. Various types are available:
- Executive summary including graphs
- Record list (where you chose the fields to report on – name, interest, principal paid, balances, outstanding amounts, etc.)
- Record list with period breaks (totals by month, quarter or year)
- Transactions report
- Accounting report to send transactions directly to your General ledger with Excel, CSV, TXT, QuickBooks, Sage.
- Merge documents to create invoices, statements, contracts, letters
Reports customizable?
Yes, see above
Able to customize reports on own or does the software company have to do it?
You customize, see above.
The Margill team can also create very specialized customized reports if needed.
Able to track short term vs long term portion of notes?
Yes
Able to assess late payment fees automatically after a specific grace period?
No and yes. You can configure Automatic fees but a human has to tell the system that the payment is paid on that date (10 days late for example) and human must change the transaction from “Due Payment” to “Paid late > 10 days” so $x fees apply. You create your own fees rules. Not very complicated actually.
Able to upload payments by csv or excel to multiple accounts at one time?
Yes but you need not do this since the schedule already exists. You change a payment from Due to Paid (or Unpaid, Late , Partial….). This can be done in bulk and there is also an option to post these payments via an Excel sheet since every single payment has a unique ID – BUT you have to give this ID to your ERP system or Accounting package in order to post back to Margill after… To be discussed…
Is there a notes section available for collections, etc?
Yes – even automatic emails if, for example there is an unpaid payment, system sends out an auto email: “Dear John, Your payment of $123.45 bounced on November 3, 2017. Please call us ASAP.”
Auto print invoices? Automated email delivery of bills?
Yes but not Auto – a human has to tell the system to send these every month – but yes sent automatically by email with a subject, text and PDF attachment.
Is the software server-based? Cloud based or both?
Server-based but about 25% of our clients use on THEIR cloud. We do not store your data.
Number of users allowed per license?
No set limit.
Automated payment notification to debtor when payment is received?
Yes by email
Able to create amortization tables within the software?
Of course!
Able to create loan docs in the software? Example: Promissory Note Agreement If so, able to use our format or required to use software company’s format?
Yes. RTF, DOCX and PDF – this is called Document Merge. You can copy/past your Word document and add images and merge fields.
ACH payment processing available within the software?
Yes
US partner: Intrix (based in Colorado and California)
Canada partner: Perceptech (Acceo) (based in Montreal)
Contract required when purchasing the software?
No except the standard End-User Agreement
Cost of software? Set up fees? Monthly or annuals fees? Per user cost?
Please contact us by email ([email protected])
Here’s a little more information:
Presentation of the software: http://www.margill.com/margill-loan-manager/Margill_Loan_Manager_Overview.pdf
More detail: http://www.margill.com/margill-loan-manager/Margill-loan-servicing-en.htm
Short videos: https://www.margill.com/en/support-center/video-guides
You can also try it for 30 days at http://www.margill.com/ncm
See our client comments: https://www.margill.com/en/client-testimonials/
We can also set up a live demo. Please contact [email protected] or call at 1-877-683-1815 or 450-621-8283.
How to enter loan number, Federal Tax ID, set up automatic late fees, create a line of credit, etc.?
Questions:
In Margill Loan Manager:
1) How/where do I enter my loan #? Can I change the identifier number automatically assigned by Margill?
2) Most of my clients are businesses, and I do not see a place to enter the Federal Tax ID number. I would also like to add fields for type of company, state of formation, year of formation.
3) When posting payments, most are not made on the exact due date, so I need to right click and post the payment into the schedule, is that correct? Also, where can I enter the type of payment and identifier, like the check number?
4) How to set up a Line of Credit account where all the payments are interest-only except the last one
5) How to automatically set up Late Fees?
Answers:
1) How/where do I enter my loan #? Can I change the identifier number automatically assigned by Margill?
A unique identifier is created automatically for each loan. You an also enter your own under Data > General:
And your loan number can show up on top of the loan window (set this up under Tools > Settings):
2) Most of my clients are businesses, and I do not see a place to enter the Federal Tax ID number. I would also like to add fields for type of company, state of formation, year of formation.
You can create as many custom fields as you want. You would create these for the Borrower and others for the Loan – you tie the field to the closest – Borrower or Loan (and even Creditor but you may not need these custom fields).
Tools > Settings:
3) When posting payments, most payments are not made on the exact due date, so I need to right click and post the payment into the schedule, is that correct? Also, where can I enter the type of payment and identifier, like check number?
You do not need to right click. You change you Line status column from a Due Pmt to a Paid Late Pmt. This small window will then appear to enter the true payment date – in this example Borrower was supposed to pay on the 1st but paid on the 22nd. The date can also be changed directly in the Pmt Date column.
The Post payment Tool (no screenshot below) allows you to post payments in batches as opposed to one by one. They can be Paid, Unpaid, Late, Partial and you can add the check number and add fees manually if you wish (or change the automatically added fees). Very flexible…
If you did not wish to charge extra interest if the payment was only a few days late, you could have entered the true payment date in the “True Pmt Date (Grace/EFT)” column without changing the “Pmt Date.” Transaction reports would pick up this special date.
You can also add a Comment to each payment line and multiple other elements that you customize.
4) How to set up a Line of Credit account where all the payments are interest-only except the last one
You would first create a Record type called Line of credit (Tools > Settings).
You then create a Record and in the Data tab enter this information. I advanced 50,000 on 9/5/17.
Notice “Irregular” payments (a screen will follow allowing you to enter advances and payments if this was an existing line of credit – ignore this window if this is a new line of credit – click on:
Once the payment schedule is calculated (one line schedule at first), you simply add lines at the end depending on whether they are Advances or Payments. Here there was a second $15,000 advance and a $3,000 payment. I also added an Information line in the year 2020 to keep the interest accruing.
You can add or insert line with the right mouse click or with these icons on the far right:
When a payment is made, column fees and then interest are paid first, then principal. In the example above, the $3,000 payment will pay principal. You could have had Margill compute the total interest to be paid (right mouse click).
If monthly payments MUST be made by the Borrower to pay interest, then you would have set up a line of credit with Monthly payments (not Irregular) and would have specified that these pay interest. This is a more advanced feature called “Line Behavior.” Let me know if this is what you want, and I can explain this in more detail.
5) How to automatically set up Late Fees?
You can create one or multiple Automatic fees.
Go to Tools > Settings > Column Fees: Automatic. You then select the Line status and create your own rules. You can charge an amount, a percentage of the balance, a percentage of the unpaid portion, etc.
Long first payment deferral versus normal one period (month) deferral
Question:
When we compare a loan using a normal amortization schedule (amortization book or calculation on an online website) we do not reach the same number of payments in Margill as in the on-line calculator. Why is this?
Here is an example:
Origination Date: July 14, 2017.
Original Principal: $ 11,374.
10% interest rate
48 months
Deferred interest and payments until Feb. 15 2018.
Normal amortization tables show payment of approx. $288.00 @ 48 months.
Margill is showing us 51 + payments @ $288.00.
Answer:
This is a most common error because of the “Deferred payment.”
Amortization tables (static) and on-line calculators cannot include deferred payments. They are usually exactly one period (often one month) after the Origination date. You could not thus get the proper payment with a 7 month deferral.
If I do a 48-month loan, with first payment exactly one month after July 14, I thus get the $288 you are looking for ($288.86 to be precise). Leave the payment blank so it is calculated.
So this is not what you are looking for since my first payment date is not properly deferred.
Let’s say we really do want 48 payments with the February date.
Because of the deferred first payment (6 months after a normal 1 month deferral) I am now at a payment of 303.81. Much higher since more interest accrued before any principal gets repaid.
From the screenshots you sent me, you want a 288.00 payment (not 288.86):
So I leave the the Amortization and Term blank and the number of payments will be computed to 52 with a last payment of $82.76.
Follow up question:
When I wrote “Deferred interest and payments” I meant thee is no interest from July 2017 to February 2018.
Follow-up answer:
You can simply change the Rate column to 0.00%. Balance then becomes minus $1047.44.
Then delete the extra lines (for which the balance is now negative) by highlighting them > right click with the mouse.
We are now at 47 payments of $288.00 and the last one at $204.61 (since no interest for 7 months).
Intercompany Loan Management with a Loan Servicing Software
Intercompany loans
Very often, when a company has many subsidiaries, branches or franchises, the head office will afford loans to these other entities. These subsidiaries in turn can lend to other entities and so forth. These intercompany loans often represent quite a challenge to the accountants and controllers since the loans are not part of the company’s core business and are most often very different from run-of-the-mill personal loans and mortgages.
The challenge of intercompany loan administration stems from multiple factors:
- These loans are often irregular with sporadic payments that are not due at set dates as in regular loans.
- They can also be interest-only, fixed-principal, principal-only, and of course, principal and interest (P&I).
- They often include irregular capital advances, so are somewhat like lines of credit adding yet another level of complexity that most loans servicing platforms cannot handle.
- Changing or variable interest rates are another challenge faced by the parent company. Often the interest rate will be x basis points above or below central bank rates or LIBOR rates (Overnight, 1 week, 3 months, etc.). Updating loans as the rates change can be a time consuming task where errors are easily made.
- In some situations, there are multiple entities involved in the same loan: multiple creditors (participating loans) and even multiple borrowers (co-borrowers) for these loans. Each has a stake as a percentage of the total loan amount or dollar amount.
- We have seen many examples where the borrower pays back more than the principal, so the lender actually becomes the borrower. The lender now owes the borrower. So negative interest is actually calculated. The roles can change regularly as the lender provides new capital advances and as the borrower pays back…
- Multinational organizations often have loans in multiple currencies.
If the people responsible for setting up loans and payment schedules are not from the banking sector, the calculation method specified in the loan agreement may not have been followed or is simply guessed based on the calculation and loan servicing tools available. This in turn may not correspond to the parties’ true contractual intent.
- Some loans in a lender’s portfolio may use one method (Simple interest) while other loans use Compound interest. Even in Compound interest, two methods are commonly seen: the Banking or Effective Rate method that uses a special formula with an exponential component; and what we term Simple Interest Capitalized where simple interest is used to calculate interest on a daily basis. And if interest is not paid at the end of the month (for monthly compounding) then the new balance (taking into account the unpaid interest portion) now generates interest. The US government often uses this method.
- The compounding frequency (annually, semi-annually, monthly, daily, etc.) must also be factored in.
- Finally, the Day count (so number of days to be used in the calculation – 365, leap year 366 and 360) may vary from loan to loan or may not even have been considered.
Since these lenders and borrowers are not professional lenders, the companies are often ill equipped to deal with these loans. Spreadsheets are the most common solution. Excel does a great job for a few loans but when the volume increases, the spreadsheets become practically unmanageable! Exceptions are simply ignored, interest improperly calculated, etc.
Our Loan Servicing Software, Margill Loan Manager offers a solution for all these problems with the capacity to easily:
- Create regular payment schedules
- Create irregular payment schedules
- Add principal advances (additional principal to a loan)
- Compute interest-only payments
- Compute principal-only payments
- Compute fixed-principal payments
- Add automatic fees for late or missed payments (although this is less common in intercompany loans)
- Create schedules using historical variable interest rates
- Increase or decrease the interest rates for one or multiple loans (in batches) based on the rate type and the new interest rate (LIBOR, Base rates, etc.)
- Include multiple entities as creditors (holding company, bank, subsidiary) and multiple entities as borrowers, co-borrowers and guarantors
- Create Participation loans (percentage ownership for creditors and for co-borrowers)
- Include not only intercompany and bank loans, but also distinguish these from unrelated third-party loans
- Allow a loan to eventually yield a negative balance with interest computed on this negative balance. The rate could even be changed or set to 0.00% when the loan becomes negative
- Create loans in various currencies, and then convert these currencies back to a unique currency based on the desired exchange rate
- When monthly or even daily transaction volumes become important, a very simple Excel file can be used to enter new payments or advances or to post set due payments directly to Margill
- Electronic Funds Transfers (EFT) (ACH) directly in Margill (US and Canada)
- Extract, in seconds, borrowing activity, P&I balances, accrued interest, paid interest, etc., for the whole loan portfolio or a part of it
- Produce the accounting Debit and Credit report which can then be imported to the company’s General Ledger (GL) in QuickBooks and Sage. The report can also be exported to generic formats: Excel, CSV and TXT
See also our White Paper on Interest calculations: https://www.margill.com/en/interest-calculation-white-paper/
You can also try our software for 30 days for free: https://www.margill.com/en/margill-loan-manager-free-trial/
Or Schedule a demo: https://www.margill.com/en/schedule-a-demo/
How to extend a loan once the loan has reached a maturity? Term is to be extended by 48 months.
Question:
How to extend a loan once the loan has reached a maturity? Term is to be extended by 48 months.
Answer:
As you may know, Margill Loan Manager is probably the most visual software on the market so this kind of change takes a second.
In the payment schedule, simply click on the 
icon to the right of the window or right click with the mouse > Add > Add Many Lines.
Then specify 48 Payments and the Payment Amount. Add other specifications such as the payment frequency (monthly or other) and when the next payment (after the initial loan end date) is to be paid.
You can also go one step more by selecting your 48 lines, right click and have the payment recomputed to give 0.00 as the final balance or another residual amount.
Even the interest rate could be changed for the next 48 payments (as always with the right mouse click):
Can you walk me through how I would update MLM to the latest version on the Cloud?
Question:
My Margill Loan Manager is installed on a server on the Cloud. It wants to have me input a path and so on, and I was not comfortable starting it. It also said to back up MLM data first, and I am not sure if that is necessary for me given that we have the server back-up every night.
Answer:
When all goes smoothly, an update should take 3-4 minutes.
If not already done, download the full update (for existing clients) at www.margill.com/get. Download from the remote server, not from your personal computer. This way, the installer will already be on the Cloud, as opposed to being on your PC.
Run the Margill Installer. It will ask for the path for the software installation. The default setting will usually be the last installation path or the C: drive which is where Margill is usually installed on the Cloud.
The Data (so where the database resides), when installed on C:\Program Files (x86) will usually be under C:\Program Data\MLM_Data.
If it is not there (as it usually should be), then an error will appear, and you will have to find the proper Data path. Search for the “DB” folder using the Windows search tool. Depending on who did the installation, data could be anywhere, so let’s hope the person who installed did a good, clean job!
ALWAYS do a backup. Everything should go smoothly with the update, but never take the chance; do a backup.
You will need basic knowledge of Windows to do this unless your paths are all properly configured.