How to Create a Positive Pay File From Acumatica
Acumatica does not export a positive pay file out of the box. The core ERP has no built-in feature that produces a check issue file in your bank's layout. Positive pay in Acumatica is handled by third-party add-ons from ISV partners, not by a standard menu command. If you do not want to buy one, you can export your check data yourself and convert it into the format your bank expects. This guide shows which report to run, the column gotchas that trip people up, and how to turn the export into a bank-ready file for free.
If positive pay is new to you, read what is positive pay first. The short version: your bank matches each check that clears against a list of checks you issued (check number, amount, and often the payee). Anything that does not match gets flagged before it pays. The list you send the bank is the positive pay file, sometimes called a check issue file.
Confirm Acumatica has no native positive pay file
There is no command in Acumatica's standard Payables module that writes a positive pay file. Several ISVs in the Acumatica Marketplace, including PC Bennett and MaxQ, sell positive pay add-ons that connect Acumatica to your bank's spec and build the file automatically. There is also a long-standing customer request to add native positive pay support, which tells you the feature is not in the base product. If you only cut a handful of checks per cycle, exporting a payment report and converting it yourself is usually faster than licensing an add-on.
Run the AP Payment Register report
The closest standard report to a check register is the AP Payment Register (report ID AP622500). Find it in the Payables workspace under the Reports area, in the Audit group. On the report form, set your selection parameters:
- From Period and To Period: the financial periods that cover the checks you need.
- Document Type: the key filter. Choose the payment type for printed checks so the report excludes credit adjustments, prepayments, and other types you do not want.
- Company/Branch and Reference Number: leave Reference Number blank to return all payments, or set it to pull a single check.
The report lists payments released in Accounts Payable, organized by document type, date, and vendor. Once it is on screen, use Acumatica's Export to Excel button on the report toolbar to get the data into a spreadsheet. If you want a wider view of every AP document, the AP Register Detailed report (AP.62.20.00) covers all document types, but you then have to filter it down to checks yourself.
The check number and column gotchas
A few things in the Acumatica export catch people, and any one of them can produce a file the bank rejects or silently misreads.
- Where the check number lives. In Acumatica the printed check number is the payment's Reference Nbr. (sometimes shown as the Payment Ref.). Make sure the column you map as the check number is the actual check number and not the internal document reference, which can differ if checks were reprinted or voided.
- Filter to checks only. The Payment Register can include payments made by methods other than check, such as ACH or wire. Those do not belong in a check issue file, so keep only check-method payments before you convert.
- Debit versus credit. A check is money leaving the account. Depending on how you build the export, the amount can appear as a credit to the bank account. Confirm the amount column is the payment amount, and that voided or zero-dollar rows are removed unless your bank's spec wants voids as a separate record type. For how to handle voids, see void checks and positive pay.
- Vendor name truncation. If you pull the data from a generic inquiry instead of the report, the exported vendor name can truncate. Banks that match on payee need the full name, so widen the field or pull the full name from the report.
- Date format. Acumatica formats dates by your regional settings. Your bank's spec expects one exact format, often
MM/DD/YYYYorYYYYMMDD. Match it before you generate the file.
Convert the export with PositivePayMaker
Once you have a clean export with check numbers, amounts, and dates, you reshape it into your bank's exact file layout. Banks each define their own fixed-width or delimited format, and typing one by hand is slow and error-prone. To understand what the fields mean, see the positive pay file format guide.
PositivePayMaker does the conversion in your browser. You upload the Acumatica export (CSV or Excel), map the columns (Reference Nbr. to check number, payment amount to amount, payment date to issue date), pick your bank's layout, and download a file ready for your bank's portal. It is free and runs entirely client-side, so your check data never leaves your browser. It ships with bank layouts including Chase and Huntington, plus a custom format builder if your bank's spec is not in the list. See all supported formats to check yours.
Validate the first file with your bank
No matter how you build it, treat the first file as a test. Generate it, then run it through the file validator to catch structural problems before upload. After that, send it to your bank and confirm they accept it and that the check numbers and amounts match. Bank specs change, and a field that is off by one position can reject the whole batch.