Dues Chaser

Dues Chaser is the automation most communities turn on first and never turn off. It runs once a day, finds properties with a balance, and works through the ladder of reminders and late fees you set, without you having to do anything. This article covers configuration and how to keep it from feeling robotic.

What it does

When dues are past due, Dues Chaser:

1. Runs every morning at 8:30am Central and reads each property’s balance from the ledger
2. Works out which of your steps land on today for that property
3. Sends the notice or applies the late fee that step calls for
4. Records what it did, so the same step never fires twice for the same property in the same cycle

You configure the ladder - what action happens at what point. Then it runs every day until you turn it off.

The standard escalation ladder

Most communities run something like this:

Days after due	Step	Channels
-7	Upcoming reminder	In-app + email
1	Friendly reminder	In-app + email
14	Second reminder	Email + text
21	Formal notice	Email + push
30	Auto-fine (late fee)	Announced by email + letter
45	Pre-collections notice	Email + letter

Adjust the days and content to your bylaws. The ladder is fully configurable. Anything past the last step - a collections referral, a lien - is the board’s call and happens outside Dues Chaser.

Setting it up

Automate → Configuration → Dues Chaser card

The screen has two tabs: Sequence & Setup (your ladder) and Activity & Status (what it has done). Under Chase Sequence, add steps with Add Chase Step, or let Herald read your dues settings and build a starting sequence for you. When the steps look right, press Schedule, review the timeline and cost estimate, and Confirm & Activate.

For each step, configure:

Field	Purpose
What this step does	Send a notice (remind the resident about their balance) or Auto-fine (charge a late fee to the account)
Timing	Days relative to the due date - negative numbers land before it. In communities that bill from Settings > Dues & Assessments, the count runs from each property’s oldest unpaid charge instead, so two neighbors who fell behind in different months sit at different steps on the same day
Notification Channels	In-App, Email, Text (SMS), Push, Letter. Letter needs Physical Mail turned on
Who Receives This	All Members, Any Balance, No Payment (paid nothing yet), or Partial Payment (paid some but not all)
Subject Line / Message Body	Your wording. Merge fields: {{RESIDENT_NAME}}, {{AMOUNT_DUE}}, {{DUE_DATE}}, {{LATE_FEE}}, {{PAY_LINK}}, {{COMMUNITY_NAME}}
Step enabled	Turn a step off to keep it without running it

Before you activate, Preview today’s run shows exactly who Herald would contact today, on which channels, for how much, and who gets skipped. Nothing is sent and nothing is charged.

Templates that work

Default templates are decent. Customize them to fit your community’s voice. A few patterns:

Tier 1: Friendly reminder (1-7 days)

Hi [resident name],

A friendly reminder that your dues for [property address] are now past due. Your current balance is [balance].

You can pay online at [pay link] - takes about a minute. If you’ve already paid, please disregard.

Thanks, The [HOA name] Board

Tier 2: Second reminder (14 days)

Hi [resident name],

Your dues for [property address] are now [days overdue] days overdue. Current balance: [balance].

Please pay by [late fee date] to avoid a late fee of [late fee amount].

Pay online: [pay link]

If you’re experiencing hardship and need to discuss a payment plan, please contact the board at [board email].

Tier 3: Formal notice (21-30 days)

Notice of overdue dues

[Resident name] [Property address]

Per [HOA name]‘s bylaws (Section [X.Y]), dues for the above property are now [days overdue] days overdue. Your current balance is [balance].

A late fee of [late fee amount] will be assessed on [date].

Payment options:

• Online: [pay link]
• Mail: [HOA address]

If you have questions about this notice, please contact [board contact].

Sincerely, [HOA name] Board

Tier 4: Pre-collections (45-60 days)

This one usually adds the Letter channel, so a printed copy goes out First-Class through Physical Mail alongside the email. More formal, references next steps if unresolved.

Who gets the notices

By default, the resident who claimed the property. But if the property has a billing contact on file (common for rentals - the landlord pays, the tenant lives there), every Dues Chaser notice goes to the billing contact instead of the resident. The tenant never gets chased for a bill that isn’t theirs.

Billing contacts with a HomeHerald account get in-app, email, text, and push like anyone else. Billing contacts without an account get email and text, whichever is on file. Physical letters follow the same rule: a Letter step goes to the billing contact - at their own mailing address if one is on file - and a late notice you mail from the Town Crier starts on the Billing contact envelope too. See Residents and contacts on a property.

One more carve-out: properties enrolled in AutoPay with a working payment method are skipped entirely - their balance is about to pay itself, so chasing them would just annoy your best payers. If AutoPay fails or pauses, the property re-enters the chase automatically.

No repeat messages

Dues Chaser does not email the same resident every day. Each step fires once per property per dues cycle (in communities that bill from Settings > Dues & Assessments, once per oldest unpaid charge), and Herald records that it did. If a daily run is missed, a step can still catch up within three days; after that it is skipped rather than sent late. The ladder starts fresh with the next cycle, or the next time the property falls behind.

Pausing

One property. On Activity & Status, the Where Each Property Stands table lists every property with a balance, an active hold, or a recorded step. Press Pause on a row to hold that property out of the ladder - bankruptcy, litigation, or a negotiated payment plan - and Resume when you’re ready.

The whole community. Turn Dues Chaser off with its toggle on the Dues Chaser screen. That stops its notices and its Auto-fine steps until you turn it back on. Sometimes you want that:

• Holiday week (don’t escalate around Christmas)
• After a billing error you’re correcting
• During a system migration

Late fees you set on an assessment in Settings > Dues & Assessments are separate from Dues Chaser and keep posting on their own.

Auto-applying late fees

The Auto-fine step is special - it adds a charge to the property’s ledger automatically.

This is the same as manually adding a late fee, just automated. Configure:

• Fine amount - a flat dollar amount (per your bylaws)
• How often - One time (once per delinquency) or Every month until paid (re-applied each month the balance stays unpaid, and stops the month it clears)
• Shows on the ledger as - the description on the ledger entry, e.g. “Late fee”

If you want late fees applied without a message, leave every channel off on the Auto-fine step - the fee is applied silently and the resident sees it on their ledger. Pick channels to announce it.

Reviewing what Dues Chaser sent

Dues Chaser → Activity & Status

• Recent Runs - one read-only record for every day Herald runs: the steps executed, how many sends went out on each channel, fines and dues charges applied, who was skipped and why (AutoPay, paused, no balance), and any errors
• Where Each Property Stands - each property’s balance, last action, and status (not yet chased, in sequence, paused, paid)

For the community-wide picture, Automate → Activity & Usage has a Dues Chaser filter that lists the late fees and dues it applied, the in-app reminders it sent, and each completed run.

Useful for:

• Investigating a resident complaint about “I never got a notice”
• Verifying the automation is working as expected
• Auditing escalation timing across the community

When residents respond

Dues Chaser emails are sent from a no-reply address, so a resident can’t answer one by hitting reply. Put the board’s contact details (and the {{PAY_LINK}}) in the message body so they know where to go.

When a resident does reach out:

• An admin should respond
• Don’t take them out of the ladder on a promise alone - sometimes residents say “I’ll pay tomorrow” and don’t

If a resident agrees to a payment plan with the board:

• Pause that property on Activity & Status so the ladder holds while the plan runs
• Track the agreed payments manually as they come in
• Resume the property once the situation is resolved

There isn’t a built-in payment-plan tracking feature - the plan itself is handled outside the automation.

Common situations

”We just turned this on and residents are getting double-emailed”

Probably a reminder you sent by hand crossed with a Dues Chaser step. Use Preview today’s run to see what Dues Chaser will send next, and hold off on manual reminders for properties it is already chasing.

”Dues Chaser sent a notice to a property that was already current”

Check the timing - the property may have paid right after Dues Chaser ran. It runs once a day at 8:30am Central; a payment that lands after that run isn’t reflected until the next morning. Annoying but harmless.

Also check the step’s Who Receives This: All Members reaches everyone, paid or not. Use Any Balance for reminders that should only go to people who owe.

If you see consistent false positives (paid properties getting chased), email support@homeherald.ai with a sample case.

”A resident says they got a fine notice on day 1 of being overdue”

Either:

• Your Auto-fine step is timed for day 1 (probably wrong)
• The fine was applied manually and Dues Chaser separately sent a notice

Check Recent Runs and the property’s row in Where Each Property Stands to see what happened.

”We want a different message for big balances vs. small balances”

Each step has one message, and steps can’t route by balance size. What you can split on is payment history: two steps on the same day, one set to No Payment and one to Partial Payment, each with its own wording.

Where to go next

• Configuring dues - the dues schedule Dues Chaser is enforcing
• Issuing refunds - for waiving late fees
• Herald Shield - similar automation for violations
• Dues Chaser feature page (marketing): /features/dues-chaser/