Versions and publishing
Collection rules change: you tweak a text, add a step, change an offset. What cannot change is the plan of those already mid-flow — nor your ability to prove, months later, exactly which sequence was in force when that debtor was contacted. That is what versions are for.
What a version is
A version is an immutable snapshot of the rule at publish time: name, classification, priority and all active steps with position, trigger, days, action, channels, tone, template and conditions. Versions are numbered (1, 2, 3...) and each publication enters the audit trail.
When a rule is used for the first time without a published version, the system publishes version 1 automatically — you do not need to remember to "publish" for the rule to work.
Enrollment: how a charge enters the rule
Each charge enters the rule through an enrollment that points to the version in force at that moment. Practical consequences:
- Editing the rule does not affect those already enrolled — active enrollments stay bound to the snapshot of the version they entered; changes apply to future charges.
- No charge enters twice — if an active or paused enrollment already exists for the charge, the system reuses the existing one, even with concurrent jobs.
The enrollment has four states:
| State | Meaning |
|---|---|
active | The rule is running for this charge |
paused | Temporarily suspended, with a reason (open dispute, "I already paid" under verification...) — resumes from where it stopped |
completed | Exited successfully (payment, agreement accepted) |
exited | Exited for another reason (cancellation, write-off, suppression) |
When the enrollment is completed or closed, every step execution not yet fired is cancelled immediately, with the reason recorded.
Automatic enrollment and the default rule
You can assign a specific rule to a charge at creation (manual, spreadsheet or API). But the most common scenario is assigning nothing — and that is where the default rule comes in:
- Mark one rule as the organization's Default;
- The daily check finds every open charge without a rule and assigns the default automatically, creating the enrollment on the version in force.
This is the "no charge left behind" guarantee: uploaded a spreadsheet with 5,000 receivables and no rule? Tomorrow they are all inside the default rule, with full telemetry.
Rules can also be linked to a customer classification and have a priority — use classifications to treat different portfolios with different rules (e.g. strategic customers get a gentler rule).
Activating rules and steps
Rules and steps are activated independently:
- An inactive rule is not used as default and does not fire steps;
- An inactive step does not fire and does not enter the snapshot of the next published version — deactivating a step is the safe way to "take it offline" without erasing history.
Why this matters in an audit
If a debtor challenges the collection in court, you need to prove what was sent, when and under which rule. The combination of immutable version + enrollment + step executions answers: "this charge entered version 3 of rule X on May 12th, received steps 1 and 2, and had step 3 suppressed due to an open dispute". None of this depends on memory or manual reconstruction.