Invoices that collect themselves, with the customer's permission
Automatic collection is not something the business turns on by itself: the customer authorizes it. From their portal they save a payment method, or tick "save" when paying an invoice, and from that day on their invoices are collected when due without anyone chasing them.
How it works
- Consent with evidence: the server records the date, IP and browser of the authorization, and automatic collection only turns on once the payment processor confirms that method for that customer.
- One charge per customer and currency: every day Cord gathers the invoices due on or after the authorization date and collects them in a single charge per currency. What was already owed before is not charged by surprise: the customer pays it from their portal.
- Advance notice: each invoice email tells the customer the date and the method that will be charged.
- Sensible retries: a stolen card, fraud or a revoked mandate turns the method off and is never retried; expired details ask for another method; if the bank requires authentication, the customer is asked to pay from the portal; insufficient funds wait for the next 1st or 16th of the month; everything else is retried after 2, 4 and 7 days, up to four card attempts. A bank debit is only retried for insufficient funds, within its scheme's window and limit: twice for SEPA, ACH and Bacs, and once for Canadian pre-authorized debit.
- Nothing is charged twice: a charge whose response never arrived is retried with the same idempotency key and, if it hasn't appeared after 20 hours, it is canceled.
- Both sides are told: the customer gets an email with their portal when a charge fails, and the business gets a task when collection stops.
Why it is in beta
The code, the retry policy and their tests are complete, and the notifications this rail needs, for confirmed authorizations and debits in progress, already arrive from the payments platform. What remains is completing the end-to-end test in test mode. Until then it is not offered as available.
How it works
The customer authorizes a method from their portal or when paying an invoice.
When invoices fall due, Cord collects the ones the authorization covers in a single charge per currency.
If the charge fails, it applies the retry policy and notifies the customer and the business.
Availability and scope
Invoices issued to customers with a portal, collected by card or, once active, by SEPA, ACH, Bacs or Canadian pre-authorized debit. Requires Cord Payments.
Clear limits
The business can't turn it on for the customer: it can only turn it off, per customer or for the whole account. It only collects invoices due on or after the authorization, and doesn't collect through Mercado Pago.