What's the difference between a fee item and a class fee?

A fee item is just the name of something you charge for, like 'Tuition' or 'Bus'. It has no price. A class fee is where you say what that item costs for a particular class in a particular term — so 'Tuition' might be one amount for JSS 1 and a different amount for SS 3. You create the fee item once, then price it for each class and term.

Do I have to set fees up again every term?

Your fee items stay — you only create those once. But the price is set per term and per session, so yes, each new term needs its class fees set before you run accounting for it. This is deliberate: it's what lets you raise fees in a new term without changing what students were charged last term.

What does Payment Priority do?

It decides which bill gets paid first when a parent pays less than the full amount. If a parent sends part payment, CloudNotte clears the oldest term first, then within that term it pays High priority fees before Medium and Low. Set Tuition to High and something like a club fee to Low, and part payments will go where you'd want them to.

When should I use an Optional fee instead of a Required one?

Use Optional for anything only some students in the class take — school bus, hostel, a trip, extra lessons. The price is set once on the class so everyone who takes it is charged the same, but nobody is charged until you give it to them from their profile. Required fees are charged to the whole class automatically when you run accounting.

Can I change a fee's amount after I've set it?

You can change the class fee amount at any time, and it will apply to students who haven't been given that fee yet. But it will not change fees already sitting on a student's account — running accounting again won't correct them either. If students have already been charged the wrong amount, see our guide on fixing fee mistakes.

Do I need a settlement account if we only collect cash?

If you genuinely only ever record cash and bank deposits by hand, you can work without one. But the moment any parent pays online or by transfer into a dedicated account, that payment needs somewhere to go — and without a settlement account set up, the payment can be recorded against the student while the money fails to reach your school's balance. Add the bank account first; it takes two minutes.

Setting Up Your School Fees

What you're setting up

Before CloudNotte can tell you who owes what, it needs three things: the names of the things you charge for, the price each class pays for them, and the bank account the money goes into. That's the fee structure, and it's set up once per term.

Everything else in Accounting sits on top of this. If the fee structure is wrong, every bill, every reminder and every report will be wrong too — so it's worth getting right before you give a single fee to a student.

You set up	Which means	Example
Fee item	The name of a thing you charge for. No price.	Tuition
Class fee	What that item costs, for one class, in one term.	JSS 1, First Term, Tuition — ₦120,000
Settlement account	The bank account online payments are paid into.	Your school's current account

Before you start

Your classes are already created in CloudNotte.

Your terms and the current session are set up.

You have your school's fee list to hand — every item, and what each class pays for it.

You have your school's bank account details (account number and bank).

You've decided who on your staff should know the Accounting PIN.

Set your Accounting PIN

Go to Settings → Accounting.

The very first time anyone opens this screen, CloudNotte asks you to set a 4-digit Accounting PIN. Until that's done, none of the accounting tabs will open.

You'll be asked for this PIN again every time you change fees, take a payment, or run accounting. It is one PIN for the whole school, shared by whoever handles money.

Choose it carefully

Because it's shared, the PIN tells CloudNotte that somebody in the finance office approved something — it can't say which person. For that you'll want the extra security code covered under Two-Factor Auth. Keep the PIN to the people who genuinely need it, and change it when someone leaves.

Add your bank account

Settings → Accounting → Settlement Account.

Click Add Bank Account and enter your school's account details. This is the account that money paid online or by transfer is settled into.

Most schools need only one. You can add more if different fees should go to different accounts — for example, if hostel money is kept separately — and then choose the account on the fee item itself.

Do this before you collect any money

If a parent pays online before an account exists, the payment can be recorded on the student's account while the money never reaches your school balance — which means the parent has a receipt and your report doesn't show it. Set the account up first.

If you ever change this account later

Changing the account number is treated as a serious change. It's recorded, the school is notified, and there is a short waiting period before payouts resume — because this is exactly what somebody would change if they wanted your school's money sent elsewhere. That's working as intended; plan for it rather than changing the account the day before a payout.

Create your fee items

Settings → Accounting → Fee Structure → Fee Items.

Click Create Fee item. For each one you'll fill in:

Fee Name — what parents will see on their bill, e.g. "Tuition", "Bus", "PTA Levy".
Payment Priority — High, Medium or Low. This decides what gets paid first when a parent pays only part of what they owe. The screen says it plainly: high priority fees are collected first if payment is not made in full.
Settlement Account (optional) — leave this off unless this particular fee should go into a different bank account from the rest.

Use Add Another Fee Item to add several in one go, then save. You'll be asked for your Accounting PIN.

Getting priority right

Think about a parent who can only send half the money this month. What do you want that half to clear?

Priority	Good for
`High`	Tuition, and anything you must collect to keep the school running.
`Medium`	Levies and regular charges that matter but can wait a little.
`Low`	Extras — clubs, optional materials, one-off items.

Older bills always come first

Priority only decides the order within a term. Whatever a parent pays goes to the oldest term they still owe for before it touches the term you're in now — so a family carrying a debt from last session will see that cleared first. That's deliberate, and it's the most common reason a payment doesn't appear against the bill a parent expected.

Price each fee for each class

Settings → Accounting → Fee Structure → Class Fees.

Click Create Class Fee and work through the screen:

Select Term — the term these prices are for.
Select Class(es) — you can tick several classes at once if they pay the same amounts.
Fee Items — the items you're pricing.
Then, under Enter Fee amount, type the amount for each item you picked.

There is also an optional Fee breakdown where you can list what a fee is made up of, if you want parents to see it itemised.

Check the term and the amount twice

There is no upper limit on a fee amount anywhere in CloudNotte — if a nought slips in, it will be accepted. A mistyped amount is by far the most expensive mistake in Accounting, because once students have been charged it, running accounting again will not correct it. Read the figure back before you save.

Choose who pays each fee

Answer 'Who pays this fee?' on each amount you enter.

Each fee amount has two choices, and they behave very differently:

Choice	What CloudNotte does
`Required` Every student in the class pays it.	Charged to the whole class automatically the moment you run accounting for that term.
`Optional` Only the students you choose pay it.	Skipped entirely when you run accounting. It waits on the class with its price already set, and you hand it to individual students from their profile using `Assign Optional Fee`.

Why optional fees are worth the effort

Because the price lives on the class, every student who takes the bus is charged exactly the same amount — nobody has to type it in each time, so nobody can type it in wrongly. It is much safer than adding a one-off fee by hand for each student.

Before you move on

Once your fee structure is set, the next step is giving those fees to students — which is a separate action called running accounting. Nothing appears on any student's account until you do it.

Ready to run accounting when

Every fee item you charge for exists, with a sensible priority.

Every class has its amounts set for the term you're about to run.

Each amount is marked Required or Optional correctly.

You've read the amounts back and none of them has a stray nought.

Your settlement account is in place.

Any discounts are NOT set up for individual students yet — those come after the run. (School-wide tag discounts can be set up beforehand.)

Common questions

What's the difference between a fee item and a class fee?: A fee item is just the name of something you charge for, like "Tuition" or "Bus". It has no price. A class fee is where you say what that item costs for a particular class in a particular term — so "Tuition" might be one amount for JSS 1 and a different amount for SS 3. You create the fee item once, then price it for each class and term.
Do I have to set fees up again every term?: Your fee items stay — you only create those once. But the price is set per term and per session, so yes, each new term needs its class fees set before you run accounting for it. This is deliberate: it's what lets you raise fees in a new term without changing what students were charged last term.
What does Payment Priority do?: It decides which bill gets paid first when a parent pays less than the full amount. If a parent sends part payment, CloudNotte clears the oldest term first, then within that term it pays High priority fees before Medium and Low. Set Tuition to High and something like a club fee to Low, and part payments will go where you'd want them to.
When should I use an Optional fee instead of a Required one?: Use Optional for anything only some students in the class take — school bus, hostel, a trip, extra lessons. The price is set once on the class so everyone who takes it is charged the same, but nobody is charged until you give it to them from their profile. Required fees are charged to the whole class automatically when you run accounting.
Can I change a fee's amount after I've set it?: You can change the class fee amount at any time, and it will apply to students who haven't been given that fee yet. But it will not change fees already sitting on a student's account — running accounting again won't correct them either. If students have already been charged the wrong amount, see our guide on fixing fee mistakes.
Do I need a settlement account if we only collect cash?: If you genuinely only ever record cash and bank deposits by hand, you can work without one. But the moment any parent pays online or by transfer into a dedicated account, that payment needs somewhere to go — and without a settlement account set up, the payment can be recorded against the student while the money fails to reach your school's balance. Add the bank account first; it takes two minutes.