Visitors paying for events on your website

When an event has a Price, a visitor on your website can register for a date and pay by card straight away, with no member login. The money goes to your church’s own Stripe account, exactly as when a member pays in the member portal. Free events work as they always have.

What the visitor does

1. On your website’s events listing, a paid date shows its price (“$25.00 per person”) and Register and pay.
2. They give their name and email, an optional note, and, if the event has add-ons (a meal, a T-shirt), how many of each they want.
3. They choose Continue to payment and pay on Stripe’s secure page. Stripe shows your church’s name.
4. Stripe sends them back to your website, which says their place is booked. Stripe emails a receipt when your church has receipts switched on in your own Stripe dashboard (Settings, then Customer emails, in Stripe).

Each form also offers Have an account? Sign in to the member portal, for members who would rather pay there.

How the place is held

• The place is held from the moment they choose Continue to payment, so two people can never pay for the last place.
• If they leave Stripe’s page without paying, the place is released within about an hour, and any add-ons go back into stock.
• A date that is full shows “This date is full” and takes no payment. Members can still join the waiting list in the member portal.

What you see

In Events, choose the event and the date. Under Who is coming:

• A visitor who has paid shows as Paid.
• HoW looks for the visitor in People by their email. If it finds one adult with that email and the same first name, the place is theirs and appears on their record. If it finds nobody, and nobody by the same full name, it adds them to People (their timeline starts “New from a paid registration on the website”). In any other case they stay a Guest, and you can choose Attach to a person from the … menu.
• Nothing is added to People for someone who did not pay.
• Their add-ons appear on the roster and in Store → Orders, as add-ons do for members.

Refunds work as for any paid place: Refund… from the … menu (see Refunds).

Before it works

• Your church must be ready to take payments in Settings → Payments (see Connecting Stripe). Until then, a paid date on your website says “Online payment isn’t set up yet. Please contact the church to pay another way.” and shows no pay button.
• The event’s Registration must be Register, and the date must not be cancelled.
• Add-ons need the store (the Commerce module). See Event add-ons.

Limits

• A visitor registers one person (themselves) per payment. Members can register their household in the portal.
• A visitor cannot join a waiting list for a paid date; members can, in the portal.
• To stop misuse, one address can start five payments an hour, one email three, and your whole website sixty. Someone who reaches a limit is asked to try again later.
• Recording cash or a check by hand is not built yet.

What DCX support can do

DCX support can check that your Stripe account is ready, look up a payment that has not shown as paid, and tell you why a visitor’s payment was refused. Support cannot take a payment for someone or change your prices.

Coming from Planning Center

Planning Center Registrations takes cards online: “You can accept online payments through credit/debit card, Apple Pay, Google Pay, or ACH bank transfers” (Collect payments in Registrations), and the people who register become profiles in People. HoW does the same: visitors pay by card (and the other ways Stripe Checkout offers your account), and a visitor who pays is found in People by email or added. Planning Center asks the visitor to log in to Church Center with a code first; HoW only asks for a name and an email.