CoBank - Positive Pay Decisioning Exception Changes

In December 2024, CoBank announced that cash management customer who use Positive Pay will face more stringent rules for passing exceptions back to customers for decisioning.

CoBank has two positive pay programs:

Standard Positive Pay:
Issued checks are compared against a file when a customer deposits them to their bank that verifies:
dollar amount
date of issue
check serial number
If all of those items match, the check is paid. If they do not match, an exception is created.
Payee Line Positive Pay:
Issued checks are compared against a file when a customer deposits them to their bank that verified:
dollar amount
date of issue
check serial number
PAYEE NAME
If all of those items match, the check is paid. If they do not match, an exception is created.

AGRIS provides a standard Positive Pay Advanced Graphic report that creates a CSV file to upload to CoBank.
This report contains all the info CoBank requires for Standard Positive Pay but AGRIS must have the formatting of the name/address, lienholders, and check forms so that what is saved to the bank description will match EXACTLY what is printed on the check.
If you are using Payee Line Positive pay, then your setup &/or operating process needs to change in AGRIS in order to provide all the info CoBank requires.

What needs to Change?

Name/Address Package:

Field	What to change
Address Line 1	Replace % with C/O C/O will cause this to be excluded from the payee name.
Address line 1	should be blank unless an C/O name
Address Line 2	PO Box should be here - Key as “PO BOX” or “P0 BOX”
Format	All name and address information must be in upper-case letters
Lienholders	All lienholders must have commodity code defined. If Commodity code is left Blank, then lienholder is offered as a printable field each time a disbursement is issued and it is saved to the bank account file. Even if your form is not defined to print NAME AND LIENHOLDER it still saves to bank.

CHECK FORMS:

No more than 4 total lines should be printed in the payee/ address field of the check, including:
• No more than 2 lines of payee information
• No more than 2 lines of address information
So this means we may want to NOT print Address Line 1 at all and just let the first two lines be the remit to
The payee name must be positioned below the horizontal midpoint of the check, and in close proximity (to the right of or just below) the “Pay To the Order Of” verbiage. The payee name should be printed in all UPPER CASE letters and should not extend past the mid-point of the check
Please Reach out to CoBank for their latest Positive Pay Guide.