In almost every tool (Pages, Paylink, Terminal, Donation) you will find the Payment type option. Here is what changes, with an example for each case.
One-off payment #
The customer pays once and the money is yours. This is nearly always the right choice: a sale, a deposit, a course registration.
Subscription #
The customer pays at regular intervals and the charge happens by itself, with nothing for you to do. Perfect for monthly fees, courses in instalments, gym memberships. The customer receives a confirmation for each charge and can cancel from their payment page. All the details in Subscriptions.
Pre-authorisation #
The amount is blocked on the card but not charged. You capture it later, in full or in part, when you know the exact sum.
Example. You rent out an e-bike for CHF 60.- and block CHF 300.- as a deposit. It comes back undamaged: you capture CHF 60.- and release the rest.
If you do not capture it, the block expires by itself after a period set by the customer’s bank, usually between 7 and 30 days. You manage everything under Payments > Pre-authorisations.
Tokenisation #
The customer saves their payment method and you can later charge agreed amounts to it. You do not store the card number: a secure code (the token) takes its place. Registration checks that the card is valid, not that it has money on it. You will find everything under Payments > Tokenisations.
This is useful, for example, if you bill monthly by usage or want to charge an extra after the service.
Not every method can do everything #
TWINT, PostFinance Pay, Visa, Mastercard, Apple Pay, Google Pay and Samsung Pay support subscriptions with the Pay provider. Purchase on invoice, crypto and Klarna accept one-off payments only. Before setting up a subscription or pre-authorisation, check that the methods you want support it.
