#benk-ach
glacial wave
Hey @cinder nymph
So a bit of background info: We have a startup that sells discounted meals for dine-in and pickup. Think doordash but for selected meals.
We work with about 20 restaurants now and expect to grow. We are already live and we use Stripe to charge our clients' virtual wallets with funds.
We collect the meal price and once week plan to send our restaurant partners, via ACH, their payouts.
cinder nymph
okay so when you say "about ACH" you mean for payouts specifically?
glacial wave
yes
cinder nymph
Can I ask what's your question exactly first? This channel is for developers asking questions about their code so I want to make sure you don't write a lot of context and then I send you to our support team instead :p
glacial wave
🙂
sure
My question is whether we can automate the ach payouts via stripe and the next part will be about pricing
cinder nymph
Gotcha so yes this is definitely supported on our end. We have a product called Stripe Connect that lets you act as a platform/marketplace, collect payments on behalf of other entities (companies or individuals) and payout their funds automatically
Main site: https://stripe.com/connect
Main docs: https://stripe.com/docs/connect
Main doc to start with: https://stripe.com/docs/connect/collect-then-transfer-guide
that doc explains how to create a connected account (to represent the business entity you accept payment on behalf of) and how to send them the funds
glacial wave
looking
I see. It's a very nice solution but I am not sure it operates the way we need it to. If I got it right, customers will be paying the restaurants directly via our platform, and we could set it up so our commission is sent to us.
But the way we operate is that clients have a virtual wallet they can load with funds, and use those fnds to purchase meals. Finally, once a week we pay our restaurants their share via ACH
cinder nymph
that's not exactly it
glacial wave
What am I missing?
cinder nymph
There are many ways to integrate Connect!
you can totally charge customers yourself, hold the funds and then later transfer part of those funds to the right connected account for the service rendered (meal)
https://stripe.com/docs/connect/charges-transfers is an example that explains this at a high level
glacial wave
reading
To simply things (because this is complex) let me break what we have so far down:
- Client charges their wallet with $30 via stripe. - our cost is 2.9% + $0.30
- Client uses their funds to purchase a meal that costs $10 (tax included)
- We pay out via ACH $10 (minus our commission) to the restaurant - our cost is $0.5
Also: Client can purchase two more meals without needing to charge their wallet, so the 2.9% + $0.30 will not be applied to these purchases
Could you please write down a similar breakdown when using stripe and the fees, so I can see the value?
cinder nymph
I won't really get into the fees sorry, https://stripe.com/pricing is extremely detailed already for that and I focus mostly on code
But you mostly
1/ Accept a payment: https://stripe.com/docs/payments/accept-a-payment (you know the fee already)
2/ You realize the funds are for restaurant A and you already created an Account for them acct_ABCDE and you can send them funds to their account balance (no fee for that)
3/ The funds are paid out to the restaurant automatically (daily by default): that has its own fee as the Connect fee described in the doc I mentioned