Version 1 (deprecated)
Specific information about the payment method PayPal.
PayPal is a safe, easy way to pay and get paid online. It is considered a classical wallet, which means, that the owner of the wallet has one or more different payment instruments such as Mastercard, Visa or Amex that he can use for payment. When executing payments via PayPal, the customer's selected payment instrument remains invisible to the outer world. It is all handled by PayPal internally, so that the payment method from the outside is simply treated as "PayPal".
In case you plan to offer PayPal as payment method, make sure to have a merchant contract with PayPal.
Payment
In case a customer of your webshop chooses to pay with PayPal, he will be seamlessly redirected by Accounting as a Service to PayPal, where he will have to log in with his PayPal-specific credentials to confirm the corresponding payment.
When using PayPal, there are two options of how to check out. The PayPal Standard Checkout flow starts on the checkout page (i.e. at the time of the payment method selection), while the PayPal Express Checkout flow picks up directly in the shopping cart.
Standard Checkout Flow
PayPal as well as Accounting as a Service generally support both standard flows, authorize and capture in 2 steps or authorize and capture in 1 step. By default, authorize and capture will be applied in 1 step. In case you want to execute authorize and capture in 2 steps as your default flow, the related configuration is part of the onboarding procedure and can be found in the technical application. Should you already have been onboarded, please contact us or send us your request for configuration change.
Also, please refer to the official PayPal rules or check your merchant contract with PayPal to identify the best way concerning payment guarantee and/or seller protection. In case you need help or advice, please contact us.
PayPal Express Checkout
For all customers with existing PayPal accounts, they can make purchases using a shortened checkout procedure without the need of entering any billing, shipping and/or credit card information, as all of this information is already stored as part of their PayPal account and will be taken over in the scope of the checkout.
However, when using PayPal's Express Checkout for payment, the customer may want to change the default shipping address as predefined in PayPal during the checkout procedure. As a result of the express checkout via PayPal, the shipping address together with additional payment details are returned to the merchant for further processing.
When it comes to the implementation of the flow, the start procedure looks different as for the other payment methods. Instead of using the pre-built UI solution and its related process, there is a dedicated endpoint and process for the express checkout to be applied as shown in the following illustration.
While using PayPal Express Checkout, you should be aware of the transaction state machine and the following exception: Instead of the status "Initialized", the following states will be applied:
| Transaction status | Description |
|---|---|
| ExpressCheckoutInitialized | Interim status applied after the redirect to PayPal has been finished |
| ExpressCheckoutFailed | Error status in case the request for checkout initialization failed for some reason |
Settlement
While the end customer pays directly to PayPal, PayPal settles to your bank account directly. Please ensure to configure your merchant account at PayPal by using a bank account that we have read-access to. By default, the bank account will have been part of the list from your technical application.
Furthermore, please note that you will have to provide the PayPal credentials for the PayPal server, so we can fetch the settlement files automatically. The information is normally provided as part of your technical application when referring to the supported payment methods.
Refund
In case of a refund to be handled as part of a return, you should follow our use case Return creation to trigger the refund procedure in Accounting as a Service. Alternatively, if the refund happens in the context of a good will procedure, please follow the use case Good will creation for triggering a good will credit within Accounting as a Service.
Disputes & chargebacks
Consumers can issue disputes / chargebacks. In this case, PayPal will hold the corresponding funds on your account and provide you with a certain time period to clarify the complaint and/or prove the correctness of the transaction. Accounting as a Service can (optionally - if you wish so) work on defending the dispute by uploading documents proving the transaction at PayPal. Nevertheless, some chargebacks can usually not be avoided. In this case PayPal will debit the chargeback amount in the settlement file, Accounting as a Service will book it on the debtor account and either start the dunning flow (if configured) or write-off the chargeback and correct the VAT for the merchant. There is a notification to inform merchants about chargebacks to enable them to e.g. block services or customer accounts
Please note that managing/defending dispute & chargebacks is part of Accounting as a Service's communication related service and can be enabled and configured during your onboarding as part of the technical application).