These days, all schools need a way to manage online payments from students or parents paying their tuition, whether they are small private institutions, public charter schools or large universities. Learn more about how tuition management software can help your tuition management become more efficient and less frustrating. This article covers what tuition management software is, the benefits of it, what to look for when selecting tuition management software and how TADS can help.
What Is Tuition Management Software?
Tuition management software is simply a third-party software that helps schools, universities, and other educational institutions manage tuition payments. The third-party companies that create this software specialize in this area and have made software to help your organization be more efficient with tuition payments.
How Does Tuition Management Software Work?
Online tuition management software is designed to be an all-in-one hub for your organization’s administration to manage financial information. Good software will support both payors and your organization instead of just being a place for payors to enter their payment information.
Here’s how this software works for your organization’s administration and the students or parents paying tuition.
How Tuition Management Systems Work for Administration
On the administration side of the software, when clients pay their tuition, you receive the funds within 24 hours. You can easily track payments and outstanding invoices on a dashboard within the tuition management system. You can also create custom financial reports within the dashboard to provide easy access to key financial information.
With the advancement of technology and the potential complexity of tuition payments, accepting credit card payments is not enough anymore. Complete tuition management systems are designed to make work easier for your administration staff while providing your organization with more abilities than you previously had.
How Tuition Management Systems Work for the Payor
When a parent or student first enters the software to pay their tuition, they need to activate their account within the system. Then they can set up their preferred payment method. Based on the information they provide, the administration’s side generates payment plans. The person paying can then choose a payment plan that works best for them. This plan could include automatic payments, reminders and other options.
Once they select their payment method, they pay their balance and receive a receipt and other information about their account without getting in touch with your administrative staff.
Tuition management software makes tuition payments easier for the person paying and administration. Some software also offers capabilities beyond collecting tuition payment data, such as features for payroll.
Benefits of Tuition Management
Now that we’ve covered how tuition management systems work, you may be starting to see some of the many benefits they can offer your organization.
Here are a few of the advantages tuition management software can provide your organization:
- Eliminate paperwork: By using a tuition management system, you can reduce or even eliminate the massive amounts of paperwork that you might be used to having. Software can also help your administration foster better communication with the people paying since they won’t be weighed down by a ton of paperwork.
- Make your organization more scalable: On top of providing flexible solutions for electronic payments, tuition management software can help you scale your organization. With tuition payment and options already set up for families, you can address other opportunities for you to expand your school.
- Save money: Since these systems help automate payment collections, you won’t need someone whose only job is to process tuition payments and handle the related paperwork. You can shift your employees’ focus to engaging with students and their families and growing your organization.
- Embrace automation: Working with tuition management software automates your operations, making it easier to conduct simple data entry and management processes. This saves time and lowers the risk of error during operations. Automated processes are becoming more prevalent with advancements in data technology. If you manage tuition and financial information digitally, automation is the fastest and most convenient option.
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Flexibility: All educational institutions and families have their own sets of needs. So why settle for anything less than the flexibility you need to thrive? Tuition management software allows you to easily customize terms and payment options, which benefits both your school and the students who attend it. Updated payment terms and improved communication can also make a huge difference in your relationship with families.
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Accurately predict costs and budgets: When it comes to finances, you need a plan that’s as accurate and efficient as possible. Manageable data technology provides a reliable and accurate way to predict costs and budgets. Predictability helps you prevent financial losses and provides some peace of mind to families who need it. With tuition management systems, you can predict incoming costs vs. profits. At the same time, the families you work with can enjoy the benefits of solid payment plans and budget-keeping options.
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Integrate Financial Aid and Tuition data: Financial aid applications increased by about 62% at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Instead of giving your staff extra work by forcing them to manage tuition and financial aid separately, you can integrate the two processes with tuition management software. TADS solutions save time and money by allowing you to integrate financial aid and tuition data. These two processes often go hand in hand, meaning you can automate and streamline them by working with us.
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Support: When you implement TADS tuition management solutions, your staff and families have access to constant support. Our team is friendly and knowledgeable, helping schools develop strategies that work. Partnering with a service provider is all about establishing a positive relationship. We do this by being proactive, answering all your questions and engaging in honest dialogue.
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A secure solution: With cyber fraud up 238% due to COVID-19, data security is more critical than ever. You need a tuition management software solution that’s protected against threats, especially when you work with sensitive information. The good news is cybersecurity methods are constantly evolving. With secure connections and frequent testing, you can prevent time- and money-wasting safety risks.
What to Look for in a Tuition Management Software
Since you now understand all of the ways these systems can help your organization, you may be wondering how to know which one to choose for your school. Here are some features that makeup quality tuition management software:
- A variety of payment options: Today, people prefer to have multiple payment options, so you must have flexible software that accommodates various payment methods. These options could include credit cards, debit cards and direct debit, which withdraw funds directly from a bank account.
- Strong financial security: In addition to flexible payment options, people need peace of mind that their financial information is secure. Quality tuition management software should have a solid encryption system that stores payment data securely, preventing hackers from accessing the information.
- Easy-to-use interface: One thing to keep in mind when selecting tuition management software is that the people using it to pay their tuition may not be especially tech-savvy. They definitely won’t be experts at working with the software. Therefore, the software must be user-friendly, easy to read and provide a seamless experience.
- A clear onboarding process: Just like your software should be easy to understand for the people paying, it should also be easy for your staff to use. One flaw that lower-quality tuition management systems have is the increased amount of time you will likely spend on training. A clear and organized onboarding process with proper training can make a significant difference in getting your team to adopt a new system. While learning a new program will always come with some difficulties, they should be limited.
How TADS Can Help
An online tuition management system can provide your organization with many benefits, from saving time and having more organization to having happier customers. These systems are an overall win-win for your organization, making managing tuition payments easier and allowing you to put more attention on other critical areas.
If you are looking for a tuition management system that can do it all, TADS can help. With over 50 years of experience, we’ve worked with more than 3,000 schools and can help you become more competitive and efficient with your tuition management system. Learn more about our tuition management system, or request a free demo to see how easy our system can make tuition management for your organization.