The purpose of this FAQ article is to help you find quick and clear answers. It covers the most commonly asked questions about the Community Development platform. If you don't see your question listed, please submit a ticket.
General Questions
What is the largest file size I can upload?
Across the system, the largest file size you can upload is 128 MB.
What kind of file types can be uploaded?
An administrator can upload the following file types: DOC, DOCX, GIF, JPEG, JPG, PDF, PNG, PPT, PPTX, TXT, XLS, XLSX
The following file types can be uploaded from the portal: AVI, DOC, DOCX, EML, GIF, JPEG, JPG, MBOX, MKV, MOV, MPEG, MP3, MP4, MSG, OGG, PDF, PNG, PPT, PPTX, TIFF, TXT, WAV, WEBM, WMA, XLS, XLSX, ZIP
Why am I being asked to save my changes?
Community Development can tell when you have unsaved changes and try to leave the page. This can happen if you refresh your browser or click on a different menu item. The warning that appears gives you a chance to save your work before proceeding.
Why do I keep getting the "Uh Oh! Something's not right" page?
Some pages in Community Development cannot be bookmarked. The system uses information from your login session to know who you are and what you're doing.
Financial and Accounting Questions
How do you reconcile payment receipts at the end of each business day?
At the end of each business day, you will generate a Fee Report. This report includes important details like the payment date, merchant number, and amount paid. You can use the report to match daily receipts with your financial records. This applies to payments made through a payment gateway or in person using a cash drawer.
Does Community Development work with credit card machines?
Community Development works with credit card machines through the CivicPlus payment feature. To use this, you need a supported payment gateway and hardware. Both must be set up before payments can be taken.
How does Community Development handle voiding and refunding transactions?
For every payment made on an invoice, there is a Reversal button. This button removes the payment from the invoice. If the payment was entered manually, such as by bank or cash, the invoice will show the payment as reversed. If the payment was made through the CivicPlus payment feature and is connected to your payment gateway, use the Reversal button. This will also void or refund the payment in the gateway. You do not need to log the refund a second time. This helps prevent double entry. For example, a resident may pay online with a credit card. If you need to give a refund, click Reversal. This will also refund the payment through the gateway.
How can I automate sending financial data to my accounting software?
You can design your Fee Report with the fields and the order in which they display. Display fields can also have custom names. Once your report is in the format that you need, you can schedule this report to be sent to a third party through SFTP. The report will always be in CSV format.
I need a Custom Fee formula. How do I get one created?
We can create Custom Fee formulas when you have a fee calculation that is beyond what our fee builder can do. This helps us handle special cases and adjust the calculation to fit your needs. Please send a support ticket to our team with a description of the calculation you need. They will be happy to set it up for you.
Fee formulas can include these fields, but are not limited to them:
project_cost
project_value
project_area_total_and_habitable
area
stories
annual_gross_receipts_current
project_area
Mapping System Questions
Why can't I see the layer I just added to my map?
Some layers can only be drawn at a certain zoom level. Try zooming in on the location where you believe your feature layer is drawn.