Goal
Submit a monthly progress report for an active case by completing the case update in the partner portal. This notifies the creditor and creates a record of your collection activity.
Prerequisites
You are logged in to the partner portal
The case is in Active status (see case lifecycle)
You are assigned as the collection partner for the case
An "Update Case Status" task has been created for the case
Steps
Open your Tasks. Go to Tasks in the partner portal. Look for tasks with the title containing "Update Case Status" or the case reference you need to update.
Click the task to open the case update. The task links directly to the case update form for that specific case. The right-hand panel shows a reference summary with debtor, creditor, financial data, and collection period status.
Select the current case status. Choose Active, Paused, or Closed. The form adapts based on your selection.
If Active - complete the update flow. The form walks you through several steps:
Payment check: Has the debtor made a payment? If yes, record the payment details. If the case is fully paid, you can close it directly.
Contact status: Has the debtor been contacted, not contacted, or not traceable?
Debtor response (if contacted): Is the debtor in dialogue, promising to pay, disputing the claim, or unresponsive? If the debtor promises to pay or agrees to an installment plan, you must upload documentary proof - this creates a collection period extension of 12 months. If the debtor disputes the claim, you can record the dispute details and upload supporting documents.
Actions taken: Select action chips for each type of collection activity (demand letter, phone calls, email, SMS, physical visit, skip tracing, negotiation). Each chip opens a detail panel where you add individual entries with dates and notes. Available action types depend on the contact status you reported.
Comments: Optional free-text comment. Required if you did not select any action chips.
What happens next: Choose your recommendation - continue pre-legal collection, recommend legal action, or suggest additional services.
On a case that qualifies, choosing "Recommend legal action" opens the legal quote wizard directly. The option is the wizard's entry point, not a precursor to it, and it skips the chooser screen that the Actions menu route on the case page shows. On that branch no separate free-text recommendation note is created - the quote and its timeline entries are the record. Submitting the wizard from inside the update posts it separately and does not reload or resubmit the rest of the update. See How to recommend or require legal action on a case you already hold.
On a case that does not qualify - for example a case born on custom terms - the option falls back to a plain free-text explanation with no quote attached. The free-text recommendation note is only created on this fallback branch.
If the case is already in Legal or Enforcement the option is not shown at all, and the neighbouring option is relabelled "Continue current collection efforts". If a legal quote is already pending when the update loads, the whole set of "what happens next" choices is replaced by a "legal quote pending client approval" banner and that step is auto-filled.
If Paused - select a reason and who needs to act. Choose a pause reason from the list. The options use these display labels: "Client needs to provide information or documents", "Client needs to make a decision", "Client needs to pay fees before we can proceed", "Awaiting debtor response", "Payment plan in progress - awaiting next installment", "Legal/court proceedings pending", "Dispute under review", and "Awaiting response from authority or third party". The platform creates a follow-up task for whichever party must act to unblock the case - either you or the creditor. A badge on each option shows who will receive the task. Provide details explaining what is needed to unblock the case.
If Closed - complete the close case form. You are redirected to the standard case closure flow.
Review and submit. A timeline preview shows what will be recorded on the case. Review your entries and submit the case update.
Result
After you submit the case update:
Structured timeline entries are created for the case - a summary note consolidating your selections, plus individual records for each logged action (one note per demand letter, email, SMS, visit, skip tracing, or negotiation entry; call records with outcome and duration for phone calls). A single submission typically generates several timeline entries.
The creditor is notified by email that a new case update has been submitted, and the update is recorded on the case timeline in their portal
Your task is marked as complete
If you recorded a promise to pay or installment agreement with proof, the collection period is extended by 12 months
If you paused the case, a follow-up task is created for the responsible party with a 14 business day deadline
If the debtor disputes the claim, a dispute record is created on the case
đ Non-Exclusive Partners
The monthly update process works the same way for Legal Network partners. Once you have an active case assigned to you (after winning a quote), you will receive monthly case update requests just like exclusive partners.
Automating updates for high case volumes
If you manage a large number of active cases, you do not have to complete each monthly case update individually. Sending us your payment and activity data does not just make the updates faster: it stops them being sent to you at all. This is set at account level, not per case, and one case update per case still arrives near the end of that case's collection period, where you decide whether to continue, escalate to legal, extend or close. Two options let you send us the data:
Collection Partner API: Push case status changes, payments, and documents to Debitura programmatically from your own system. This is the most automated option for partners handling high case volumes. See Collection Partner API and integration overview.
Excel or CSV file import: Send us your activity or status reports as an Excel or CSV file and our team can import the updates to your cases on your behalf. This needs a one-time setup to map your file's columns to Debitura's fields - contact us through the support chat in your portal to arrange it.
Note: Bulk import supports Excel and CSV files only - legacy .xls, .xlsx and .csv are all fine, but scanned documents and PDF reports cannot be imported. Until one of these options is set up for your account, you complete a case update per case through the form described above.
If you send us your payment and activity data instead, the monthly case updates stop. See Automate your monthly case updates.
While a legal quote is awaiting the client's decision
While an incumbent legal quote is awaiting the client's decision, no new automatic update request is created for that case.
This does not cancel a request that was already open. A request generated before the quote was sent remains open and you can still submit it while the quote is pending. In that state the "what happens next" choices are replaced by a pending-quote banner and treated as already answered, and the duplicate free-text "recommends legal action" note is suppressed.
After the quote is approved, declined or expires, the next scheduler run applies the ordinary cadence rules again. A new request is created only if the case is already due and has no open request - resolving the quote does not itself force a new update.
The suppression is per case and temporary. It does not pause the case and it does not affect your other cases.
Separately, an open case-update request does not survive a change of partner. Update requests belong to the partner they were raised for, so a request left open when a case is reassigned is closed rather than handed to the incoming partner - the obligation always sits with the partner actually working the case.
Tips
Update frequency: Case updates are generated monthly while the case remains active. You can also update the case at any time outside the monthly case update by using the case detail page to log notes and calls.
Meet your deadline: Each case update task has a deadline. Complete it on time to maintain good standing. See Tasks for more on managing deadlines.
Alternative entry point: You can also access the case update from the case detail page. Go to Cases Received, open the relevant case, and look for the case update prompt or pending task.
Collection period pre-selection: If the collection period has more than 30 days remaining, "Continue pre-legal collection" is pre-selected as the recommended next step. When the period is ending or expired, you must make a deliberate choice.