In this article we explain how to handle bank transfer payments on bookingkit.
Important: In order for our payment service provider Stripe to automatically assign the transfer to your end customer, it is essential that the correct payment reason is specified in the transfer.
Why make payments via bank transfer?
Do you have corporate clients and want to offer a special rate? Does one of your clients want to pay by invoice? No problem: This can all be easily handled with bookingkit in just three steps:
1. Create a manual reservation
Click on the green "Add Booking" button in the upper right corner of your bookingkit account, select the relevant experience and date, and enter the end customer's information in the next step. Our step-by-step guide explains how to proceed.
2. Select bank transfer as the payment method
3. Stripe will handle the payment for you
Your clients will receive a confirmation e-mail with the outstanding invoice amount and account details, including the reason for payment.
As soon as our payment provider Stripe receives a payment with the same reason, the system will change the order status on bookingkit to paid (green). The invoices and payment instructions you display in the customer's order will be adjusted accordingly.
4. Activate the bank transfer on your site
Nothing could be easier! You can enable bank transfer payments by going to Settings > Payment Options.
And this is how you customers will see it:
5. What happens if I receive the money after the reservation has already expired?
In this case, you will automatically receive an e-mail notification. At this point you can either refund the money to the customer or work out an agreement and create a manual reservation (as 'already paid').
6. Important note about creating a manual order with the bank transfer payment method
In this case, when creating the order you should make sure to accept the service first and save the order only at the end. Only then can the system automatically add the required bank details, including the reason for payment.
However, you can manually force this at any time by changing the payment method from "bank transfer" to "payment on site" and then back to "bank transfer." The bank details will then be generated by the system. 💪
7. Why is it not possible to refund an order with the payment method "bank transfer"?
For data protection reasons, neither we nor our payment provider Stripe have the end customer's bank details - we only see them in encrypted form. In this case, you will have to reimburse with a voucher or contact the end customer to get the bank details.
a) Refund with a voucher:
b) Refund outside bookingkit:
8. What happens if the end customer has specified the wrong refernce or transferred the wrong amount?
If the incorrect refernce is specified, Stripe can still successfully allocate the transfer automatically using the unique IBAN.
If a different amount with the correct purpose is transferred to the correct IBAN, Stripe will also successfully allocate it automatically.
9. important note on payment reminders/dunning run
In this case, Stripe does not send automatic payment reminders to the end customer. The reminder run is carried out exclusively manually by you as the provider.
10. Can I only activate payments by bank transfer for certain experiences?
In general, all payment methods (with the exception of "Payment on site") can only be activated or deactivated per account. Control at experience level is not technically possible at this point.
11. A Booking with Duplicate or Multiple Payment Assignments via Bank Transfers
A customer accidentally used the same IBAN for several invoice payments, causing all payments to be assigned to the same booking, while the other bookings remain marked as "open."
There are the following ways to resolve this issue:
You can either manually mark all relevant bookings as "paid" by changing the payment method to "On-site Payment." Then click on "Add payment" and finally select "On-site Payment." You can add a note that the booking has been adjusted with the overpaid booking. However, the payment status of the overpaid booking will remain as "Refund needed."
Alternatively, you can refund the overpayment to the customer and ask them to resend the amounts with the correct bank details. The bank details can be found at the bottom of the invoice.
The first option is simpler and faster.