Hold
A hold records that a consumer is inside a formal proceeding that shields them from enforcement while it runs. Debt review under the National Credit Act 34 of 2005 (South Africa) §86 is the one Woodgrove Bank starts with, and the state itself is generic — a sanctions freeze, a court order or another jurisdiction’s equivalent is configuration, not a release.
The hold sits on the person, not on one agreement. It covers every account they hold, and several can run at once — a consumer in debt review who then dies carries both. Each one names the protected state it records, and you lift them one at a time.
It is also independent of their status. A suspended consumer can be held and stays suspended; placing a hold never changes a status by itself. For which of the two to reach for, see suspending or holding a customer.
You work with it on the Hold panel of the counterparty screen.
What the panel shows
| Row | What it tells you |
|---|---|
| Status | Held, or not held |
| Hold status | Which protected state this is — debt review, out of the box |
| Reference | The proceeding’s reference number |
| Debt counsellor | Who is running the proceeding, where one applies |
| Effective from | The date the hold applies from |
| Recorded on | The date a clerk recorded it on this system |
The two dates are separate on purpose. A proceeding reported three weeks late still applies from the day it started, so Effective from is the date that governs and Recorded on is the date you captured it.
Placing a hold
- Open the counterparty and select the Hold panel.
- Select Place hold.
- Record the hold status and the reference number.
- Record the date the hold applies from.
- Record the debt counsellor and their reference, where the proceeding has one.
- Select Place hold to confirm.
The hold status, the reference number and the effective date are required. The counsellor details are not: a hold for a death or a court order has no counsellor, and the fields stay empty.
Because they are optional, nothing refuses a debt-review hold recorded with no counsellor. Your organisation’s own review of the record is what catches that today.
A consumer already held cannot be given a second hold.
Placing and lifting a hold are both eligible for countersign, so your organisation can require a second pair of eyes on either.
What changes while a hold runs
flowchart TD
A[Place hold] --> B[Every open collections case goes on hold]
B --> C[Held cases leave the work queue and route to the review pool]
A --> D[Enforcement notices are refused]
A --> E[Nothing is presented for collection on the due date]
A --> F[Account operations are refused unless permitted under a hold]
A --> G[Statements, interest and default charges carry on]| What stops | What keeps running |
|---|---|
| Issuing an enforcement notice | Statements, on their statutory cycle |
| Progressing to the point where enforcement may begin | Interest, fees and default charges |
| Presenting the instalment for collection on the due date | Voluntary payments the consumer makes |
| Amending the agreement, except under a court order or consent | Payments arriving from a payment distribution agent |
| Recording the outcome of a call on a held case |
Two of those are worth spelling out.
Notice eligibility is still observed. Passing the statutory waiting period is a fact about the arrears, so the system still records it. What the hold bars is acting on it.
The mandate survives. A debit-order authority the consumer gave you is not cancelled by the hold. The instalment simply is not presented while the hold runs, and the account records why on the day it fell due.
What this platform claims, and what it does not
The behaviour above is registered against the National Credit Act 34 of 2005 (South Africa) §86 — debt review as a protected state.
The claim the record can answer is narrow and deliberate:
No collector was dispensed this account after the effective date, and nothing was presented for collection.
It is not a claim that no collector touched the account. Recording the outcome of a contact on a held case stays allowed on purpose. An inbound call reaches whoever answers it, and refusing to log that call pushes the contact history onto a notepad — which is worse for an auditor than logging it.
Three more limits, stated plainly:
- Default charges and fee accrual continue. The agreement runs on its existing terms until it is restructured. The hold protects the consumer from enforcement, not from the cost of the credit.
- Lifting a hold is a person’s decision. Nothing lifts a hold automatically. A clerk records it, and the reason is kept.
- The counsellor is not enforced. A debt-review hold can be recorded with no counsellor named, and nothing refuses it.
Placing a hold is also not an acknowledgement of the debt, so it does not restart any limitation clock. Where an application does amount to an acknowledgement in a particular matter, record that deliberately — see writing off a bad debt.
A hold is not a freeze. A freeze stops outbound money for a whole counterparty; a hold holds collections work and bars enforcement. See counterparty clearance.
Changing the agreement while a hold runs
Ordinary amendments are refused while a hold runs. That refusal is the default for every operation, and each operation must be marked as permitted under a hold to be an exception.
Out of the box the one exception on lending products is Restructure Under Debt Review. It asks for the court order or consent reference and the restructured payment schedule, and it needs a second approver.
The refusal names the operation you tried, so a clerk can see which one is blocked rather than guessing.
Lifting a hold
- Open the Hold panel.
- Select Lift hold.
- Choose a reason.
- Select Lift hold to confirm.
| Reason | When you use it |
|---|---|
| Cleared | The proceeding ended or was terminated, and no restructure is in force |
| Restructure in force | The agreement now runs on its restructured terms |
Either reason lifts the hold on every one of the consumer’s open cases and returns them to the work queue. Amendments and enforcement become available again from that moment.
A consumer who is not held cannot have a hold lifted.
A worked example
Alex holds a loan with Woodgrove Bank that collects by debit order. The next instalment is 1,500, due on 2 March 2026, and Woodgrove raises its instructions three days ahead of the due date.
Alex applies for debt review, and a clerk records the hold on the Hold panel.
- Alex’s collections cases go on hold and leave the work queue.
- On 27 February, three days before the due date, nothing is raised.
- On 2 March the account records that nothing was presented, and why: the consumer is held.
- Nothing further is recorded on the days after the due date. The reason is captured once, on the day the instalment fell due — not every day.
- The 1,500 is still owed. Interest and any default charges keep running, and a payment Alex chooses to make is received normally.
When the counsellor’s restructure is granted, a clerk runs Restructure Under Debt Review with the court order reference and the new schedule, then lifts the hold with the reason Restructure in force.
What your organisation configures
- Which hold statuses exist. Debt review is the one seeded for a South African consumer-lending tenant. A tenant under another regime configures its own, and a tenant under none has this panel switched off entirely — see switching features on and off.
- Where held cases go. The queue a held case routes to, and whether it leaves the ordinary work queue at all, are settings on the hold status your organisation defines.
- Which operations survive a hold. Every operation is refused by default. Each one your organisation wants available during a hold must say so — which is how a new operation fails toward protecting the consumer rather than away from it.
- Whether placing or lifting needs a second approver.
Turning the capability off warns you if any hold is still standing, because a standing hold keeps blocking operations and no other screen can lift it.