The Complete Guide to BHPH Payment Reminder Automation
What goes wrong when a Buy Here Pay Here dealership sends payment reminders by hand, how automated reminders work, and which accounts still need a person on the phone.
On this page
What problems arise when BHPH dealers manually send payment reminders?
When a Buy Here Pay Here (BHPH) dealer sends payment reminders by hand, the reminders go out late, unevenly, or not at all, because each one depends on a person having time that day. Customers who would have paid with a nudge pay late instead. Staff spend their hours on routine texts and calls, so the accounts that need a real conversation wait. The dealership has no reliable record of who was contacted. And the work grows with every car sold, fastest on weekly and biweekly payment schedules.
- Operational
- Inconsistent outreach, missed reminders, a heavy staff workload, no clear order for working late accounts, and a process that breaks as the loan book grows.
- Financial
- Payments arrive later, more accounts slide from a few days late into real delinquency, and collector time goes to accounts that never needed a collector.
- Customer service
- Customers get reminded on some due dates and not others, and often hear from the dealership only after they are late.
What is BHPH payment reminder automation?
BHPH payment reminder automation is software that sends a Buy Here Pay Here dealership’s customers messages about their car payments, by text, email, or app notification, on a set schedule. The schedule runs off each account’s due date and payment status. No staff member writes or sends the individual messages.
A complete setup covers the whole payment cycle. It reminds the customer before a payment is due, confirms a payment when it goes through, tells the customer when a payment fails, and follows up when an account goes past due.
Reminders matter more in Buy Here Pay Here than in most lending:
- The dealer is the lender. A BHPH dealership sells the car, finances it, and collects the payments itself. There is no outside finance company doing the reminding.
- Payments are frequent. Schedules are often weekly or biweekly, set to match when the customer gets paid. That means many more due dates per account than a monthly loan has. Federal Reserve staff who studied loans reported to a credit bureau found about 14% of subprime BHPH balances on weekly or biweekly schedules, against less than 1% at traditional auto lenders (Federal Reserve, 2026).
- Collecting is most of the work. Carpay’s founder ran a BHPH dealership before he built software. He found that collecting payments wasn’t one part of the business. It was the business.
If the vocabulary is new, the BHPH glossary defines note, servicing, delinquency, and the other terms used on this page.
What are the operational challenges of manual payment reminders?
Manual payment reminders fail in six ways. Outreach is inconsistent. Reminders get missed. Staff time goes to routine messages. Collectors can’t put the right accounts first. Payments come in later. And the process doesn’t scale with the loan book.
| Challenge | What happens with manual reminders | What it leads to |
|---|---|---|
| Inconsistent outreach | Whether a customer hears from the dealership depends on who is working, how busy the day is, and which accounts that person thinks of first. | Two customers in the same situation get treated differently, and nobody can say for sure who was contacted. |
| Missed reminders | The list gets skipped on a busy Friday, during a vacation, or when the person who sends it is out sick. | Customers who would have paid with a nudge go late. |
| Staff workload | Someone builds a due list, looks up each phone number, types or pastes each message, and logs it. Then does it again next cycle. | Hours every week go to messages that all say about the same thing. |
| Collections prioritization | Routine reminders and inbound payment calls fill the collector’s day. | The accounts that need a conversation wait behind the ones that only needed a text. |
| Delayed payments | Reminders go out after the due date, or only once the account shows up on a late list. | Payments that were always going to be made come in late, and cash flow gets harder to predict. |
| Scalability | Every car sold adds due dates. Weekly and biweekly schedules add them faster. | The process that worked at 80 accounts stops working at 300, and the usual fix is another hire. |
How many payment reminders does a BHPH loan book need?
Count due dates, not accounts. A dealership with 300 active accounts on monthly payments has 300 due dates a month. The same 300 accounts on weekly payments have about 1,300.
| Payment schedule | Due dates per account, per year | Due dates per month, 300 accounts |
|---|---|---|
| Weekly | 52 | 1,300 |
| Biweekly | 26 | 650 |
| Semi-monthly | 24 | 600 |
| Monthly | 12 | 300 |
This is arithmetic, not survey data: accounts, times payments per year, divided by 12.
One reminder per due date is the floor. Add a confirmation for each payment and a follow-up for each late one, and a 300-account weekly book needs well over a thousand messages a month. Nobody sends that many by hand and gets every one right.
The Federal Reserve staff who wrote that 2026 study made the same point from the lender’s side: weekly repayments “create more opportunities to miss a payment.” They also noted the advantage. Frequent payments let a dealer see that a customer is in trouble sooner.
What do manual reminders cost a dealership?
The costs don’t show up as a line item, but they are real.
- Later payments. Some late payments happen because the customer is short that week, and no message fixes that. Others happen because the customer forgot the date. A reminder fixes the second kind, and a manual process misses some of them every cycle.
- Accounts that slide. Without a consistent first follow-up, an account that is three days late can be two weeks late before anyone calls.
- Collector time. Every hour a collector spends sending routine reminders is an hour not spent on the accounts that need a decision.
What do customers experience when reminders are manual?
- Uneven treatment. A customer gets a reminder one month and nothing the next, for no reason they can see.
- The first contact is about being late. When reminders slip, the first message a customer gets is a collections call. A customer who gets a heads-up before the due date has a different relationship with the dealership than one who only hears from it when they’re behind.
- Tied to office hours. Manual reminders go out when staff are at their desks. That is when many customers are at work and can’t act on them.
- No record. When a customer says they never got a reminder, a manual process has somebody’s memory to go on. That makes disputes harder to settle fairly.
How does payment reminder automation work?
Reminder automation reads each account’s due date, amount due, and payment status from the dealership’s loan data, then sends a message at set points in the payment cycle. When a payment comes in, the account’s status changes and the messages change with it.
Scheduled text, email, and app notifications
The dealership sets the schedule once: which messages go out, how far ahead of the due date, and on which channels. After that, the software sends them for every account, every cycle.
- Text (SMS) reaches the customer on the phone they already carry, and the customer can answer it.
- Email works as a second channel and leaves a written record.
- Push notifications reach customers who have the dealership’s payment app installed and notifications turned on.
What should a payment reminder say?
The dealership’s name, the amount due, the due date, and a way to pay. A couple of sentences is enough. A text can be read by whoever is holding the phone, so keep it to what the customer needs to act on.
Payment-status awareness
A reminder system that only knows the calendar sends “your payment is due” to someone who paid yesterday. A status-aware system picks the message from where the account stands right now.
| Account status | Message | What it’s for |
|---|---|---|
| Payment coming up, customer pays manually | Payment due reminder | Puts the due date, the amount, and a way to pay in front of the customer. |
| Payment coming up, customer is on autopay | Upcoming automatic payment notice | Gives the customer time to make sure the money is in the account. |
| Payment received | Payment confirmation | Works as a receipt, so the customer doesn’t call to ask if it went through. |
| Payment failed | Failed payment alert | Gets a declined card or failed draft fixed before the account goes late. |
| Past due | Overdue notice, then a follow-up sequence | Keeps follow-up consistent, based on how many days late the account is. |
Timing based on payment frequency
The schedule has to follow each account’s own due dates. A reminder sent a week ahead makes sense on a monthly payment. On a weekly payment, a week ahead is the previous due date. Weekly and biweekly schedules need a short lead time and one reminder per cycle, so the customer doesn’t hear from the dealership more often than they pay it.
Integration with payment systems
A reminder works best when the customer can pay from the message itself. Three connections make that possible:
- The reminder leads to a payment. It carries a link to pay, or the customer replies with a keyword and the card on file is charged.
- The payment updates the account. Once it goes through, the customer gets a confirmation and stops getting reminders for that payment.
- The loan data stays current. Due dates, balances, and payment schedules come from the dealer management system (DMS), and payments post back to it. Without that sync, reminders go out with the wrong date or the wrong amount.
How does reminder automation handle common BHPH payment scenarios?
Automation handles the routine version of each scenario and hands the exceptions to a person. The six scenarios below come up at every Buy Here Pay Here dealership: weekly and biweekly payers, a missed payment, a failed autopay, a partial payment, a customer who needs a payment arrangement, and an account that closes.
A weekly or biweekly payer
A weekly payer has 52 due dates a year. A biweekly payer has 26. The reminder has to arrive close to payday and can’t pile up.
- What the software does
- Sends one reminder per cycle with a short lead time, such as the day before or the morning of the due date, then a confirmation when the payment posts.
- Where a person comes in
- When the customer’s payday changes and the schedule itself needs to move.
A missed payment
The due date passes and nothing comes in.
- What the software does
- Sends an overdue notice, then a sequence of follow-up texts and emails spaced by how many days late the account is.
- Where a person comes in
- When the sequence runs its course without a payment, or the customer replies with a problem instead of a payment.
A failed autopay
The customer is enrolled in autopay, but the card is declined or the draft fails.
- What the software does
- Sends a failed payment alert right away, so the customer can fix the card or pay another way before the account goes late.
- Where a person comes in
- When the same account fails more than once. That can mean the payment date no longer matches the customer’s payday.
A partial payment
The customer pays $60 toward a $100 payment.
- What the software does
- Records the payment and keeps treating the account as short. A system that marks the account paid stops reminding too early. One that ignores the payment sends a message with the wrong amount.
- Where a person comes in
- Deciding whether the dealership takes partial payments at all, and what happens to the remainder.
A customer who needs a payment arrangement
The customer calls before the due date. Their hours got cut, and they can pay Friday instead of Tuesday.
- What the software does
- Nothing, until a person makes the decision. After that it should carry out the arrangement: remind on the new date and hold off on collections messages in the meantime.
- Where a person comes in
- The whole conversation. Somebody who knows the account decides what the dealership will accept.
A paid-off or repossessed account
The loan is paid off, or the vehicle has been ordered for repossession.
- What the software does
- Stops. A payment reminder sent to a customer who has paid off the car, or whose car has been picked up, is a mistake the customer remembers. Either the reminder system picks up the status change from the DMS, or someone closes the account in both places.
- Where a person comes in
- Recording the status change in the DMS when it happens, and handling the repossession itself, including the customer’s rights under state law to catch up or get the vehicle back.
What should be automated, and what still needs a collector?
Automate the messages that are the same for every customer in the same situation: upcoming payment reminders, confirmations, failed payment alerts, and the first follow-ups on a late account. Keep a person on anything that needs a decision, such as a hardship, a dispute, a payment arrangement, or a repossession.
| Situation | Who handles it | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Payment due soon or due today | Automation | The message is the same for every account: date, amount, and how to pay. |
| Payment received | Automation | A receipt needs no judgment. |
| Card declined or autopay failed | Automation first | The customer can often fix it once they know. Repeat failures go to a person. |
| First days past due | Automation first | A consistent, timed follow-up catches the forgotten payment. No reply means a person takes over. |
| Office closures and changed hours | Automation | One announcement goes to every customer at once. |
| Lost job, cut hours, or another hardship | A person | Somebody has to decide what the dealership will accept. |
| Disputed amount or balance | A person | It takes someone who can read the account and the contract. |
| Request for an extension or arrangement | A person, then automation | A person agrees to the terms. The software carries them out. |
| Broken promise to pay | A person | The next step depends on the customer’s history. |
| Repossession decision | A person | It is a business and legal decision, and reminders should stop once it is made. |
A reminder can’t manufacture money that isn’t there, but it can keep a forgotten payment from becoming a collections problem.
From The loan is on the books. Now what? on the Carpay blog
When should an account move from automated reminders to a person?
- The customer replies to a reminder with a question or a problem instead of a payment.
- A follow-up sequence finishes and the account is still past due.
- Autopay fails more than once on the same account.
- The customer asks to change a due date or a payment amount.
- The account ages from the first few days late into the next delinquency bucket.
The point of automating the routine messages is to give collectors that time back.
When should automated reminders stop altogether?
Some accounts should come off automated messages until a person has looked at them:
- The loan is paid off, or the vehicle has been repossessed or traded in.
- The customer has filed for bankruptcy. The automatic stay that comes with a filing stops most collection activity against the customer (US Courts).
- The customer has opted out of texts. Their reminders have to move to another channel.
- The customer disputes what is owed, or has asked the dealership to stop contacting them. What the dealership has to do next depends on state law.
- The customer has died.
- The phone number turns out to belong to someone else.
Does automating reminders mean losing touch with customers?
No. The call a collector makes to a customer who is in trouble is how a dealership finds out what is going on with that account, and that call stays. What goes away is the call that only said the payment is due Friday. With two-way texting, a customer who has a problem can answer the reminder and reach a person.
How do payment reminders, text-to-pay, autopay, and self-service payments work together?
A reminder only helps if the customer can act on it right then. Text-to-pay turns the reminder into the payment. Autopay removes the need for the customer to act at all. Self-service payment channels cover everyone else, at any hour. Together they mean a routine payment never needs a staff member.
| Capability | What it does | Who it fits |
|---|---|---|
| Payment reminders | Tell the customer a payment is coming, went through, failed, or is overdue. | Every account. |
| Text-to-pay | Lets the customer pay by answering the reminder, using a card on file. | Customers who make each payment themselves and have a card saved. |
| Autopay | Drafts the payment on schedule from a saved payment method. | Customers whose payday is predictable. |
| Self-service payments | Let the customer pay through an app, a web portal, an automated phone line, or in cash at a retail store, without calling or visiting the dealership. | Customers who pay after hours, don’t have a smartphone, or pay in cash. |
| Late-account follow-up | Sends a timed sequence of texts and emails to past-due accounts. | Accounts in their first days late. |
| One-off payment links | Collect a specific amount without taking a card number over the phone. | A customer who isn’t in the office. |
What does one payment cycle look like with all four in place?
- The reminder goes out ahead of the due date, on the channels the customer chose.
- A customer on autopay does nothing. The payment drafts on schedule and a confirmation follows.
- A customer with a card on file replies to the text. The payment is done from the message, with no login.
- Everyone else pays on their own time in the app, on the web, by automated phone line, or in cash at a store.
- If a payment fails or nothing arrives, the customer gets a failed payment or overdue notice, and a follow-up sequence starts.
- If the sequence ends without a payment, a collector picks up the account, with the message history in front of them.
Carpay wrote up how dealerships get customers to use text-to-pay in The Text-to-Pay Adoption Playbook.
What should a dealership consider before automating payment reminders?
Five things decide whether reminder automation works: when messages go out, what customers have asked for, whether the dealership has consent to text and email them, whether the contact and loan data are accurate, and whether anyone is measuring the results.
Timing
- Match the lead time to the pay cycle. A few days ahead suits a monthly payment. The day before or the day of suits a weekly one.
- Be consistent. Pick a lead time and keep it. A reminder that arrives at the same point every cycle becomes part of the customer’s routine.
- Make it sound like the dealership. A reminder that names the dealership, the amount, and the due date reads as a message from someone the customer does business with. That matters, because people are right to be wary of payment links in texts they don’t recognize.
- Watch the volume. A weekly payer who gets a reminder and a confirmation for every payment receives more than 100 texts a year. Keep each one short, and let the customer turn off the ones they don’t want.
- Send during the day, in the customer’s time zone.
Customer preferences
Some customers want a text. Some read email. Some want both, and some want a confirmation but no reminder. Let the customer choose, and the messages are more likely to be read. Language is part of this too. Offer reminders in Spanish where customers prefer it.
Consent and communication compliance
This section is general information, not legal advice. The rules depend on the state, on how messages are sent, and on what they say. No software makes a dealership compliant by itself.
- Text messages. The Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) restricts robocalls and robotexts without the prior express consent of the person receiving them, with limited exemptions (FCC, 2024). In practice, get the customer’s consent to payment texts in writing at the sale, and keep the record.
- Opt-outs. A payment reminder is not marketing, and that lowers the bar for consent up front. It does not take away the customer’s ability to opt out. FCC rules let a consumer revoke consent to automated texts, informational ones included, and require the sender to honor the request within a reasonable time, not to exceed 10 business days. Treat a reply like “stop texting me” that reaches a staff member the same as STOP. The FCC has amended its consent revocation rule more than once since 2024, so read the current text of 47 CFR 64.1200.
- After an opt-out. The payment is still due, and the dealership can still reach the customer by email, by mail, or with a phone call from a person. Every account that has opted out of texts needs another way to get its reminder.
- Carrier rules. The wireless industry’s own guidelines say a consumer should agree to informational texts when they give a business their number, and that senders should honor opt-out requests such as a reply of STOP (CTIA Messaging Principles and Best Practices, 2023). These are industry rules that carriers enforce, not statutes.
- Email. Under the CAN-SPAM Act, an email about a transaction the customer already agreed to is a “transactional or relationship” message. It is exempt from most of the Act’s requirements, but it can’t carry false or misleading routing information. Add marketing content and more of the rules can apply (FTC CAN-SPAM compliance guide).
- Collections law. The federal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act generally doesn’t cover an original creditor collecting its own debt (CFPB). It does cover a creditor that collects under another name in a way that suggests a third party is doing the collecting (Regulation F, section 1006.2). Other federal law still reaches dealers. In 2014 the CFPB ordered a Buy Here Pay Here dealer to pay an $8 million penalty over collection calls to workplaces, references, and wrong numbers that kept coming after people asked for them to stop (CFPB, 2014). Most states also have their own debt collection laws, and some of those cover the original creditor. A state independent dealer association is a good first call for the rules where a dealership operates.
Whatever system sends the messages, three records are worth keeping: the customer’s consent, every message sent and whether it was delivered, and every opt-out.
Data accuracy
An automated reminder is only as good as the phone number it goes to and the due date it quotes.
- Contact information. Phone numbers change. A number collected at the sale can’t be assumed to work a year later, so watch for failed deliveries and update the number when a customer calls in. A home number from the DMS may be a landline that can’t receive a text.
- Wrong numbers. A payment text that reaches the wrong person is more than a failed delivery. That person never agreed to get it, and it tells a stranger about a customer’s account. The FCC runs a Reassigned Numbers Database that callers can check. When someone says a number isn’t the customer’s, take it off the account that day.
- Loan data. Due dates, amounts, and payment frequency should come from the DMS, not from a spreadsheet somebody re-keys.
- Account status. Paid-off and repossessed accounts have to come off the reminder schedule the day their status changes.
Measuring performance
Write down the numbers before turning automation on, then check them on a schedule. Any reminder system worth using can report these.
| Metric | How to measure it | What it tells you |
|---|---|---|
| Reminder delivery | Messages sent vs. messages that failed to deliver. | Whether messages are reaching customers. A falling delivery rate usually points to bad contact information. |
| Payments after outreach | Payments made after a late-account text or email. | Whether follow-up on late accounts produces payments. |
| Delinquency by age | Share of accounts that are current, 1–10, 11–30, 31–60, 61–90, and 91+ days late. | Whether accounts are being caught early or sliding into later buckets. |
| Autopay adoption | Share of open accounts enrolled in autopay. | How many accounts pay without needing a reminder to act on. |
| Payments made without staff | Payments customers made themselves vs. payments staff processed. | How much of the routine payment work has moved off the front desk. |
| Opt-outs | Customers who have stopped text reminders. | Whether the schedule is sending too much. Each of these accounts needs another way to get its reminder. |
| Replies | Reminders answered with a question instead of a payment. | Where customers are confused, and which accounts need a person. |
Read the numbers together. If autopay adoption is climbing but delinquency isn’t improving, that is a question worth looking into. If more accounts are moving from 1–10 days late into 11–30, the first follow-up isn’t doing its job.
What should a BHPH dealer look for in payment reminder software?
Look for software built around how Buy Here Pay Here works: weekly and biweekly payment schedules, a two-way sync with the DMS, a way to pay straight from the reminder, payment options for customers without a card or a smartphone, follow-up for late accounts, and a record of every message.
These are the questions to put to any vendor, including the DMS a dealership already uses.
| What to ask | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| Was it built for Buy Here Pay Here? | A tool designed around monthly bills struggles with weekly payers, cash payers, and arrangements that change. |
| Does it handle weekly and biweekly schedules? | Reminders have to follow each account’s own due dates, with one reminder per cycle. |
| Does it sync with the DMS in both directions? | Due dates and balances come from the DMS, and payments should post back without anyone re-keying them. |
| Can the customer pay from the reminder? | Every extra step loses some customers. Replying to the text is the shortest path to a payment. |
| What if the customer has no card or no smartphone? | An automated phone line and a cash option make the reminder useful to every customer. |
| Does it follow up on late accounts? | Reminders before the due date are half the job. The other half is consistent follow-up after a missed payment, with a way to pause it for one customer. |
| Are reminders available in Spanish? | A reminder works only if the customer can read it. |
| Can customers choose what they get? | A customer who can turn off one kind of message is less likely to opt out of all of them. |
| Does it keep a record of every message? | When a customer says they never got a reminder, the dealership needs to know. |
| Can you see whether it’s working? | Delivery, delinquency by age, and autopay adoption should be in one place. |
| What are the terms? | Ask about contract length, cancellation fees, and whether texts are billed per message. |
How does Carpay automate BHPH payment reminders?
Carpay is loan servicing and payment software built only for Buy Here Pay Here dealers. It sends payment reminders by text, email, and push notification on a schedule each dealership sets, lets customers pay by replying PAY, runs autopay, and follows up on past-due accounts with Work Late Accounts™.
Everything above applies whatever software a dealership uses. This is how Carpay answers the same questions.
| Question | Carpay |
|---|---|
| Built for Buy Here Pay Here | Yes, and only Buy Here Pay Here. Carpay was started by a BHPH dealer who built it to fix payment collection at his own dealership. |
| Weekly and biweekly schedules | Reminders run on a schedule the dealership sets, and autopay can draft weekly, biweekly, or monthly. |
| DMS sync | Carpay syncs with the dealership’s DMS and posts payments back to it. The DMS stays the system of record. |
| Paying from the reminder | The customer replies PAY and the card on file is charged. Any other reply reaches dealership staff. |
| No card or no smartphone | An automated phone line takes payments 24 hours a day, and customers can pay cash at participating retail locations. There is also a mobile app and a web portal. |
| Late accounts | Work Late Accounts™ sends automated text and email follow-up to past-due accounts, and a sequence can be paused for one customer. |
| Spanish | Reminders are available in English and Spanish. |
| Customer choice | Customers choose which notifications they get by text and by email. |
| Message record | Every text and email is logged as delivered or not delivered. |
| Results | The dealer dashboard shows reminder delivery, delinquency by age, and autopay adoption. |
| Terms | Month to month, with no contracts and no cancellation fees. Text and email notifications are unlimited. |
Carpay reports 20% lower delinquency across its platform for customers who pay through Carpay than for those who don’t. That figure covers the whole platform, not reminders alone.
The full product is described on the BHPH loan management software page, and a dealer who wants to see reminders running on real accounts can schedule a demo.
Questions and answers about BHPH payment reminders
What is BHPH payment reminder automation?
BHPH payment reminder automation is software that sends a Buy Here Pay Here dealership’s customers text, email, or app messages about their car payments on a set schedule, based on each account’s due date and payment status. It covers reminders before the due date, payment confirmations, failed payment alerts, and follow-up on past-due accounts, without a staff member sending each message.
What problems arise when BHPH dealers manually send payment reminders?
Manual reminders go out late, unevenly, or not at all, because each one depends on a person having time that day. Customers who would have paid with a nudge pay late. Staff time goes to routine messages while the accounts that need a conversation wait. The dealership has no reliable record of who was contacted, and the workload grows with every car sold, fastest on weekly and biweekly schedules.
Do automated payment reminders reduce late payments?
They reduce the late payments that come from forgetting the due date or losing track of it. A reminder does not help a customer who doesn’t have the money that week. That account needs a conversation with a person.
When should a BHPH dealer send payment reminders?
Match the lead time to the payment schedule. A few days before the due date suits a monthly payment. The day before or the morning of suits a weekly or biweekly payment. Send one reminder per cycle, at the same point every cycle, and follow each payment with a confirmation.
How do payment reminders work for weekly and biweekly payers?
Each account’s reminders follow its own due dates, so a weekly payer gets a reminder every week and a biweekly payer every two weeks. The lead time is short, usually a day or less, so one cycle’s reminder doesn’t overlap the last. A 300-account book on weekly payments has about 1,300 due dates a month, which is why weekly-pay dealerships are the ones that most need reminders automated.
Can automated reminders replace a collector?
No. Automation handles the messages that are the same for every customer in the same situation: upcoming payments, confirmations, failed payment alerts, and the first follow-ups on a late account. A collector still handles hardships, disputes, payment arrangements, broken promises, and repossession decisions. Automating the routine messages gives the collector more time for those.
What is text-to-pay?
Text-to-pay lets a customer make a payment by answering a text message. The customer replies with a keyword and the card on file is charged, with no login and no app. In Carpay the keyword is PAY, and any other reply reaches dealership staff.
Do BHPH dealers need customer consent to send payment reminder texts?
In general, yes for automated texts. The Telephone Consumer Protection Act restricts robotexts without the recipient’s prior express consent, and FCC rules require a business to honor a request to stop within a reasonable time, not to exceed 10 business days. State laws add their own requirements. A common practice is to collect written consent at the sale and keep it with the deal. This is general information, not legal advice.
What happens to reminders when a customer makes a partial payment?
The system should record the payment and keep treating the account as short for the remainder. The dealership decides whether to accept partial payments in the first place, and the reminder system should follow that policy.
What happens when a customer needs a payment arrangement?
A person makes the arrangement, and the software carries it out. It moves the reminder to the new date and holds collections messages until then. Whoever made the arrangement should record it on the account, so the next person who opens it knows what was agreed.
How do you stop reminders on a paid-off or repossessed account?
The account’s status has to change in the system that sends the reminders. Either that system picks up the change from the DMS, or someone closes the account in both places. A dealership should know which one its setup does, because a reminder sent after a payoff or a repossession is a mistake the customer remembers.
How do you measure whether payment reminders are working?
Track reminder delivery (messages sent vs. failed), payments made after late-account outreach, delinquency by age bucket, autopay adoption, the share of payments made without staff involvement, and how many customers have opted out of texts. Record the numbers before automating and compare them on a regular schedule.
Does payment reminder automation work with a dealer management system (DMS)?
It has to. Due dates, balances, and payment schedules live in the DMS, and reminders built on stale data go out with the wrong date or amount. Carpay syncs with the dealership’s DMS and posts payments back to it, so the DMS stays the system of record for the loan.
Can a customer opt out of payment reminder texts?
Yes. A payment reminder is not marketing, but a customer can still opt out of automated texts, and FCC rules require the sender to honor the request within a reasonable time, not to exceed 10 business days. The payment is still due. The dealership can keep reminding the customer by email, by mail, or with a phone call from a person. This is general information, not legal advice.
What should a BHPH dealer look for in payment reminder software?
Software built around how Buy Here Pay Here works. Ask whether it handles weekly and biweekly schedules, syncs with the DMS in both directions, lets the customer pay straight from the reminder, offers a phone line and a cash option for customers without a card or a smartphone, follows up on late accounts, sends reminders in Spanish, and keeps a record of every message. Ask about contract length and per-message fees too.
Are Carpay payment reminders available in Spanish?
Yes. Carpay payment reminders are available in English and Spanish.
Does Carpay send automated payment reminders?
Yes. Carpay sends payment reminders by text, email, and push notification on a schedule the dealership sets, and text and email notifications are unlimited. Customers can reply PAY to a reminder to pay with the card on file, and Work Late Accounts™ sends automated follow-up sequences to past-due accounts.
Sources
- Olena Chyruk, David Cox, Lily Liu, James Wang, and Stephen Zoulalian, “Subprime Auto Lending: Trends in Buy Here Pay Here Auto Lending,” FEDS Notes, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, May 8, 2026. federalreserve.gov
- Federal Communications Commission, “FCC Adopts New Rules to Empower Consumers to Stop Unwanted Robocalls and Robotexts,” February 15, 2024. docs.fcc.gov
- Code of Federal Regulations, 47 CFR 64.1200, Delivery restrictions. ecfr.gov
- CTIA, Messaging Principles and Best Practices, May 2023. ctia.org
- Federal Trade Commission, “CAN-SPAM Act: A Compliance Guide for Business.” ftc.gov
- Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, “What laws limit what debt collectors can say or do?” consumerfinance.gov
- Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Regulation F, 12 CFR 1006.2, Definitions. consumerfinance.gov
- Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, “CFPB Takes First Action Against ‘Buy-Here, Pay-Here’ Auto Dealer,” November 19, 2014. consumerfinance.gov
- Federal Communications Commission, Reassigned Numbers Database. fcc.gov
- United States Courts, Bankruptcy Basics Glossary, “automatic stay.” uscourts.gov
- Carpay Help Center, “Work Late Accounts.” support.carpay.com
Statements about what Carpay does come from Carpay’s own product documentation and website. This page is reviewed when the product changes, and the date at the top shows the last update.