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8.1. Patron Credit

Last Updated 10/30/2023

What is Patron Credit?

Patron Credit is a payment type that allows patrons to make payments larger than any amount owed. Evergreen will track the patron's credit balance, which can be applied to bills accrued by the patron in the future. For example, in the screenshot below, the patron owes $12.80 in fines. If the patron were to give the desk staff member $15 to apply to the patron account with the checked box Convert Change to Patron Credit, the remaining $2.30 would show as a Credit Available balance that the patron could apply to future bills.

By default, the payment type Patron Credit is enabled in the staff client. Within the Bills interface of a patron’s account, the Patron Credit payment type, the Credit Available, and the option to Convert Change to Patron Credit are exposed by default in the staff client.

If your library system does not wish to allow patrons to accrue a credit balance on their accounts, an administrator can turn off this functionality with the Library Setting, Disable Patron Credit. When the Library Setting, Disable Patron Credit, is set to True, the patron credit payment type will be disabled. Patron Credit will not be an option within the payment type dropdown menu. The Convert Change to Patron Credit and the summary of Credit Available will be hidden from the patron billing interface in the staff client.

To set this Library Setting: