Accounts & finances · ABA files and remittance

ABA files and remittance

The full lifecycle of paying suppliers via bank transfer — from generating the ABA file in Navigator, uploading it to your bank, processing the result file when the bank reports back, marking the extract complete, and the remittance advice that automatically goes to suppliers.

9 min read Last updated April 2026

The end-to-end flow

Six stages, in order. Each one happens in Navigator except the bank step in the middle.

Stage 1

Generate

Eligible invoices bundled into an ABA file

Stage 2

Download

ABA file pulled from Navigator

Stage 3

Bank

File uploaded to your bank's portal

Stage 4

Result

Bank result file uploaded back into Navigator

Stage 5

Complete

Extract marked complete in Navigator

Stage 6

Remittance

Remittance advice sent to each supplier

For the bigger picture of how invoices move through statuses on either side of this flow, see Payment status flow.

Generating the ABA file

The bank-transfer extract is created from Extracts → New extract → Bank transfer. Navigator looks across the account for invoices ready to pay and groups them into a single ABA file (or several files, if the batch is large enough to need splitting).

Which invoices are included

Invoice status: only invoices at NDIS Claim Paid qualify — meaning the NDIS has paid the funds across to your account but the supplier hasn't been paid yet
Supplier setting: the supplier must have Include in payment extract enabled on their profile
Bank details on file: BSB (exactly 6 digits), account number, and account name
No blocking claim rule: if the supplier has a pending bank-detail-change verification or any other claim block, those invoices are skipped
Not already in another extract: the invoice can't already be included in a non-deleted extract

Pre-flight validation runs before the file is generated. If anything fails (invalid BSB, an invoice already paid, a supplier with a self-reference circular transfer), the extract isn't created and the error message tells you exactly which invoice or supplier needs attention.

What's in the file

The ABA file is the standard Australian Bankers' Association format every Australian bank accepts for bulk credits. Each invoice becomes one transaction row:

BSB 062-000 Acct 1234 5678 Name Acme Therapy Amount $425.00 Ref INV-4821

BSB 183-334 Acct 8765 4321 Name MobilityPlus Pty Ltd Amount $1,260.00 Ref INV-5104

BSB 484-799 Acct 9988 7766 Name CarePath Supports Amount $880.00 Ref INV-5188

... + a self-balancing debit row at the end (if your bank requires it)

Some banks need a self-balancing ABA file where the credits sum to a final debit row. This is a per-account setting Navigator handles automatically — it's worked out by trial when you first onboard your bank, and you generally don't need to touch it again.

File naming

Files are named with a short reference and a date stamp, e.g. SPM-260428-K9H001.aba. Multiple files are generated when an extract has more rows than fit in a single ABA — you'll see them numbered in the extract detail page.

Downloading and uploading to the bank

From the extract detail page:

Download each ABA file using the link next to it. If there's only one, that's all you need. If the extract has been split, download each.
Log in to your bank's online portal and find the bulk-credit / batch-payment upload area. The exact wording varies by bank.
Upload each ABA file in turn. Most banks queue them up and ask you to authorise the batch.
Authorise / process the payment. Depending on your bank, this might require a second user to approve.
Wait for the bank to confirm the payments are out. Don't return to Navigator and mark complete yet — wait until the bank has processed the file and (ideally) given you a result file or remittance back.

Uploading the bank result file

Once the bank confirms the payments and provides a result/response file (the format varies by bank), you can upload it back into Navigator to reconcile what actually paid:

Open the extract in Navigator.
Click Upload result and select the file from your bank.
Navigator processes the file in the background — there's a spinner that auto-refreshes every few seconds.
Successful rows mark their corresponding invoices as Paid. Failed rows are listed with the bank's error message so you can investigate.

Result-file ingestion is optional for bank transfers. If your bank doesn't supply a structured result file, you can still mark the extract complete manually and trust that the payments went through — but you lose the per-row reconciliation, which means no automatic flagging of partial failures.

Result files are processed asynchronously Navigator queues the upload and processes it in the background. You can leave the page and come back — the status will show pending, completed, or failed once it's done. While a result file is pending, you can't upload another to the same extract.

Marking the extract complete

Once the bank has actually processed the payments (and you've uploaded any result file), mark the extract complete in Navigator. This is the trigger for remittance advice to go out, so don't do it before the money has actually moved.

Open the extract.
Click Complete extract and confirm.
Navigator records the completion time, marks any remaining invoices as Paid (where the result file hasn't already done so), and dispatches remittance jobs.

Mark complete is one-way Once an extract is complete, remittance advice has been sent to suppliers. You can't delete a completed extract or undo the completion. If something needs correcting, you'll handle it through manual adjustments and a follow-up communication — not by reverting the extract.

Remittance advice

The moment a bank-transfer extract is marked complete, Navigator queues a remittance advice job for each supplier in the batch. Every supplier with one or more invoices in the extract gets:

An emailed remittance PDF showing the customer name, invoice reference, and amount paid for each of their invoices in this extract
An archived task recorded against the supplier so your team has a log of what went out
A copy attached to the supplier's record in case they ask you to resend it later

What's in the email

The email is short and table-formatted. The body says:

Attached is the remittance advice for your account with [Organisation name]. You can respond to this email if you have any queries.

Then a table:

Reference · Customer name · Amount paid

See the catalogue entry for the full template: Remittance advice.

When remittance won't send

Supplier has no email address — Navigator can't send anything. The PDF is still generated and saved, and you can manually share it
Remittance has already been sent for that extract — Navigator deduplicates by supplier + extract. If you need to resend, there's an explicit resend action that sets a flag

Common issues and how to handle them

! Supplier has invalid or missing bank details

Pre-flight validation blocks the extract from being created. The error names the supplier and the field that's wrong (most often: a BSB that isn't exactly 6 digits, or a missing account number).

Fix: open the supplier record, correct the bank details, and try the extract again. If the supplier just changed their bank details, expect a verification task — see the next item.

! Invoice missing from the extract

The invoice meets some criteria but not all. Quick checks:

Status must be NDIS Claim Paid — anything earlier in the lifecycle isn't eligible yet
Supplier must have Include in payment extract on
Bank details must be valid
The supplier mustn't have a pending bank-change verification task — those block their invoices until verified. See the Bank Details Changed tag
The invoice mustn't already be in another extract

! Bank result file shows failed payments

The result-file processor lists each failed row with the bank's reason. Common causes are an account that's been closed, mistyped account numbers, or insufficient funds at the bank account level.

Fix: investigate the failure with the supplier. If their bank details are out of date, update them, then create a new bank-transfer extract for the failed invoices only — they'll go back into eligibility because they never moved to Paid for the failed rows.

! Need to delete an extract

Extracts can only be deleted within 10 minutes of being created, and only if they haven't been completed. After 10 minutes, or after completion (which sends remittance), the extract is locked.

If you spot a mistake later, the right path is to upload a result file with no successful rows (or skip that step entirely), then handle each affected invoice manually rather than try to delete the extract.

! Supplier didn't get their remittance email

Most likely reasons:

No email address on the supplier record — Navigator can't send if there's nowhere to send to
Their email provider routed it to spam — ask them to check
Their email was previously blocked — check the supplier record for a blocked-email indicator

Fix: open the extract, find the supplier, use the resend remittance action. The PDF is the same one originally sent and is also attached to the supplier's record if you need to forward it manually.

Important rules

Don't mark complete until the bank has processed the file. Marking complete sends remittance — telling suppliers they've been paid before the bank has actually moved the money creates problems.
Result file processing is asynchronous. Watch the status in the extract detail page; don't try to upload a second result file while the first is still processing.
Mark complete is irreversible. Once done, remittance is out and the extract is locked.
Each ABA file has a row limit. Large extracts get split automatically — make sure you upload every file to the bank, not just the first.
Self-balancing files are a bank-by-bank thing. If your bank rejects an ABA file with an "unable to balance transaction" error, this setting needs adjusting on your account — talk to your Kismet contact.