# Billing & online payments ## Billing accounts To be able to make use of the car sharing service, a user needs to have a billing account. A billing account is an internal checkings account which is used for all chargable actions the user does for this service. {% hint style="info" %} Note: the system can be configured not to use billing and only use the reservation system. In this case the organizaton is responsible for charging the end user. This can be done by connecting to the platform through our REST API. {% endhint %} Depending on how the user gets access to the app the creation of the billing account is handled by the platform itself. ### Transactions A billing account collects all the chargeable actions a user does on the platform. This includes, making a reservation, using a vehicle, etc. Each such action is recorded as a transaction that the user can consult in the transaction overview in the app. Transactions are charged in the internal currency *credits*. The platform can be configured so that concept of credits is not shown to the user. The user will see all chargable actions in the equivalent monetary currency. By default the platform is setup to not show credits to the user. 1 credit = €0.01 in this case. ### Prepaid and subscription A billing account can be prepaid or have an active subscription. **Prepaid** When prepaid, the account first needs to be topped up with credits. This can be done by buying a bundle in the in-app shop or an administrator can manually add credits to the billing account. Once charged with credits, the user will be able to make reservations and use the cars until he/she has run out of credits and will need to buy credits again. **Subscription** A subscription can come with included credits or it can be completely postpaid where the user collects a negative debt for their usage on the billing account and this is billed at the end of the billing cycle. A combination of both is also possible. With a subscription the billing account has a certain billing cycle. Every billing cycle the user will be charged according to the subscription. More elaborate information in the chapter below. ### Recalculation of future reservations When the billing account changes from prepaid to subscription, from subscription to prepaid or from subscription A to subscription B, the billing of all future reservations is recalculated so the new tariff applies for these reservations. If there is an active reservation, also the billing of this reservation will be recalculated. If the platform would not recalculate the current active reservation the create and update step could be according to the old tariff, while the end usage billing step would be according to the new tariff. Still applying the old tariff when the active reservation ends, is not possible. ### Purchase multiple times A product can be purchased multiple times in one payment if the option "Multiple quantities allowed" is set in the product details in the control center. {% hint style="info" %} It is possible to enable the option not only for prepaid products but also for subscriptions. The user can adjust the quantity when contracting the subscription. The user can not adjust the quantity in the APP once the subscription is running. Admin users can adjust the quantity of running subscriptions in the control center under Service Contract -> Edit subscription {% endhint %} ### Personal and shared billing accounts #### Personal billing account A personal billing account is configured on the level of the person. A personal billing account can be linked to a single person or it can be shared by multiple persons (e.g. users of the same family). This way they have separate logins and a separate list of reservations in the app, but there billing is shared without the need of setting up a group. You can add a 2nd person to the personal billing account of a 1st person in control center. #### Group shared billing account A group shared billing account is configured on the level of the group. A group shared billing account is automatically used by all members of that group. This is typically used in case of a company. All employees are added to the group and the billing account bundles all billing for reservations done in that group. There is the possibility to define a group shared billing account admin. This admin can see all transactions on the billing account. Normal members cannot. #### Multiple billing accounts A billing account is linked with the group membership or service contract of the person. In other words, when a user is member of multiple groups or has access to multiple service, he can have a separate billing account for each of those groups/service. For example, he can have a personal billing account for personal trips and use a shared billing account of his company for work related trips. ## Subscriptions A subscription has a certain billing cycle. Every billing cycle the user will be charged according *items* that make up the subscription. The payment can be done automatically through a SEPA payment or via credit card. SEPA payments are only supported with [Mollie](https://mollie.com). ### SEPA Direct Debit The platform supports SEPA Direct Debit payments thourgh the payment provider Mollie. With SEPA Direct Debit the platform directly debits from the user's bank account (via Mollie). A valid SEPA mandate is needed to be able to do this. #### Mandates SEPA mandates can be added through control center or can be obtained through a *first* payment. A mandate is the authorization of the user to take money from their bank account. A first payment is the initial payment the user does when they activate the subscription in the app. The first payment delivers a mandate and guarantees the users' bank account. More information about this can be read [here in the Mollie documentation](https://help.mollie.com/hc/en-us/articles/214072489-How-do-I-use-Mollie-Recurring-). {% hint style="info" %} Note: It's the members responsibility to follow up on the SEPA mandates. Especially for mandates added manually through control center. A written agreement with the end-user might be legally required depending on your country. When the user cancels the mandate the SEPA direct debit transaction will fail. Mollie charges charge back costs for this. {% endhint %} {% hint style="info" %} Note: If a subscription is activated through control center and, no mandate is created automatically. There is the option to create a mandate manually in the Control Center. When there is no mandate, the invoice is created in the connected invocing platform and sent to the user. So, the user is expected to pay it, but the member is responsible to do the follow up. {% endhint %} #### Delivery and payment When a subscription's billing cycle comes round the platform creates an order for the subscription renewal. The order will contain the different components of the subscription. For example a fee and the consumed driving budget. The order is immediately delivered to the billing account of the user. The user sees this a transaction in the app in their overview. The actual payment for this order will happen 15 days after the delivery. The platform will send a SEPA direct debit payment to Mollie. In the orders overview of Control Center as well as in the Mollie dashboard the status for every payment can be seen. {% hint style="info" %} The platform can be configured that an email is send to the user when the subscription renewal happened and that the due amount will be charged via SEPA direct debit from their bank account in 15 days. {% endhint %} ### Subscription cycle The cycle for subscription renewal can be: * monthly starting on the date the subscription was activated * yearly starting on the date the subscription was activated * every first of the month, for the ongoing month the fraction of the subscription cost is charged. ### Types of subscriptions A subscription can consist out one or more of the following items: * a subscription fee: payed every billing cycling * an activation fee: only payed once with the activation of the subscription * a deactivation fee: only payed once with the deactivation of the subscription * included credits: a fixed amount of credits that's added every billing cycle * consumed credits: the amount of consumed credits during the billing cycle * discounts/surcharges/custom: custom items can be configured. ### Duration of the subscription A subscription can run indefinitely or end after a certain amount of months. For subscriptions with an end date it's possible that the platform reactivates the subscription automatically again. The difference with the billing cycle is that the activation fee will be charged again and it possible to give the user time to cancel the reactivation. ### Subscription management in the app What users can do with their subscription depends on how its reactivation is\ configured. When a user has an active subscription, they can stop it if the\ subscription is reactivated automatically. If a subscription is configured to be\ reactivated manually, the user can extend it. If a subscription has no\ configuration for reactivation, users won't be able to either stop or extend it\ and the existing subscription can only be managed via Control Center. ### Example subscriptions #### **Included credits, user is not allowed to consume more** The user receives every month €100 worth in driving credits. The €100 is payed for automatically via SEPA incasso. When the user consumes their €100 completely within the month the user will not be allowed to collect a negative debt and will have to top-up additional credits with a prepaid bundle. If the user did not consume the €100 driving budget the remainder is carried over to the next month. #### **Included credits, user is allowed to consume more** The user receives every month €100 worth in driving credits. The €100 is payed for automatically via SEPA incasso. When the user consumes their €100 completely within the month the user will start to collect a negative debt on the billing account. These additional credits will be billed at the end of the billing cycle. If the user did not consume the €100 driving budget the remainder is carried over to the next month. #### **Fixed monthly fee and consumed credits for usage** The user pays every month a fixed fee of €50. The driving credits they consume as they use the vehicles in the month collect as a negative debt on the billing account. At the end of the billing cycle the €50 and the consumed credits are billed via SEPA incasso. #### **Fixed 3 monthly fee and consumed credits for usage** The pays an activation fee of €250. The subscription is active for 3 months. Every month the consumed driving credits are billed via SEPA incasso. At the end of the 3 months the subscription is automatically reactivated and the user is charged the €250 again. Unless the user has chosen in the app to not have this reactivation. ## Invoicing The platform can be connected to invoicing services. See the section about integrating a 3rd party service. For every purchase and subscription renewal the platform creates an invoice in the invoicing service. ## Online payment providers Purchases in the in-app shop and SEPA direct debits happen through an online payment provider. The platform supports the following online payment providers. ### Mollie Mollie can be used for both prepaid and postpaid payment methods. #### SEPA direct debit {% hint style="info" %} Search for "mollie SEPA direct debit" in your search engine for more Mollie specific documentation {% endhint %} Mollie has a default SEPA direct debit customer limit of a €1000. A request to Mollie can be made to make this limit higher. The platform has currently 2 features to handle this situation: 1. A warning email can be send when Mollie denies the creation of the SEPA direct debit payment because the amount is above the max. 2. A limit can be configured on how much negative debt can be collected on a billing account. ### Stripe Stripe can be used for prepaid credit card payments as well as recurring credit card payments ###