Waiving the fee for a single payment, and the corrected totals in the customer and installer portals, require Powercode build 26.10.05 or later.
A credit card processing fee passes some of your card processing cost on to the customer. When a fee is set, Powercode adds it to every credit card payment it runs through your payment gateway and records it on the customer's account as a separate charge. You can charge a flat amount or a percentage of the payment, but not both.
Staff taking a payment on a customer's account in the admin portal can waive the fee for that one payment.
The fee settings are on Config > Billing & Payments > Billing:
Both are described on that page as Add a processing fee to payments made through the credit card gateway.
| Permission | Why it is needed |
|---|---|
| Billing Settings (System → Configuration) | At Edit, to open the Billing settings page and change the fees. |
| Payments (Customer → Billing) | At Edit, to take a payment on a customer's account in the admin portal or the installer portal. Anyone who can take a payment in the admin portal can also waive the fee. There is no separate permission for the waiver. |
To turn the flat fee off, choose [None]. Only One Time services are listed. If you have none, the page shows You must configure a One-Time service fee first.
To turn the percentage fee off, set it to 0.
Only one fee is ever charged. If a flat fee is set, Powercode charges the flat fee and ignores the percentage. The percentage is only used when Credit Card Processing Fee is set to [None].
The fee is added to every credit card payment Powercode runs through your gateway, wherever it starts:
Bank account payments are never charged a processing fee. Only credit card fees can be set.
The fee can only be waived on the admin portal's Make Payment page. Payments made anywhere else always include it.
To take a payment, open the customer's billing tab and, under Accounting, click Submit CreditCard or BankAccount Payment. On the Confirmation step of Make Payment, when a fee is set and a credit card is selected, you see:
When a bank account is selected, the fee, the checkbox and Total are hidden, and no fee is charged.
On the payment confirmation, the customer sees Pay with, Amount, the fee line and Total. If they pay with a bank account, the fee line is hidden and Total is the payment amount. The Billing page also shows the fee under the Make a Payment link.
The confirmation shows Amount, the fee line and Total. When a bank account is selected, the fee line is hidden and Total is the payment amount.
In all three places, the Total shown matches what is charged: the flat fee if one is set, otherwise the percentage, and no fee on bank accounts. In earlier builds, the customer and installer portals added both fees to the total when both were set, and the installer portal added the fee to bank account payments, so the total shown could be higher than the amount actually charged.
When the payment succeeds:
If the payment fails, no fee is charged.
A percentage fee is worked out on the payment amount. For example, a $100.00 payment with a 3% fee charges the card $103.00, adds a $3.00 fee charge to the account, and records a $103.00 payment.
The Minimum CreditCard Amount check applies to the payment amount before the fee is added.
The card is charged the payment amount only, and no fee charge is added to the account. The event log entry for the payment ends with The processing fee was waived for this payment. and records the user who took the payment.
The waiver only applies to that payment. The checkbox starts unticked each time you open Make Payment, and it is unticked automatically if you switch to a bank account.
| Symptom | Likely cause |
|---|---|
| You must configure a One-Time service fee first. | There are no One Time services to choose from. Create one for the fee, then choose it. |
| The percentage fee is not being charged | A flat fee is also set, and the flat fee always wins. Set Credit Card Processing Fee to [None]. |
| No fee, waiver checkbox or Total on Make Payment | No fee is set, or a bank account is selected. |
| There is no way to waive the fee in the customer or installer portal | Only the admin portal's Make Payment page can waive the fee. |
| Payment amount ... is less than the Minimum CreditCard Amount. | The payment amount, before the fee, is below Minimum CreditCard Amount. |
| A customer was charged the fee on an automatic payment | The fee applies to every credit card payment, including automatic ones. |