Payment policy
Decide which payment methods memberships, club-collected invoices and member purchases may use - and put guard rails around your Direct Debit mandates.
Connecting a payment provider says what is possible. The payment policy says what your club actually allows. It exists because a Direct Debit mandate is not a blank cheque: most clubs sign members up to Direct Debit for membership, and would not dream of quietly pulling a race entry fee off the same mandate without asking.
You will find it under Financials → Settings.
Three kinds of payment
The policy is organised by who starts the payment, because that is what changes the answer.
Recurring membership payments
The subscription your members signed up for.
- Billing method - Direct Debit only, card only, or either. Pin it and the wrong rail simply cannot be chosen when issuing a membership, so nobody sets a member up the wrong way by accident.
- Require a mandate before activation - a Direct Debit membership waits in Pending until the member's mandate exists, then activates itself. Useful when membership genuinely should not start until payment is arranged.
- Allow paying membership invoices by card - whether a member may settle a membership invoice with a card instead of the agreed Direct Debit.
Club-initiated payments
When the club collects a one-off invoice automatically - a bulk race-fee run, an invoice set to auto-collect. Choose which saved instruments you are willing to charge:
- the member's Direct Debit mandate,
- their saved card,
- or neither - in which case one-off invoices are always paid by the member themselves.
This is the setting most clubs get wrong. Forbidding Direct Debit here without also excluding cards means the club will still charge a saved card off-session. If your rule is "members pay their own one-offs", untick both.
Member-initiated payments
What a member is offered when they pay - settling an invoice, buying a ticket, paying a course fee:
- Card,
- Instant bank payment - a one-off open banking payment approved in their banking app,
- Charge to their Direct Debit - an explicit one-off collection against their existing mandate.
Include the last one and members can put a race fee on the Direct Debit they already have. Leave it out and every purchase is paid with a fresh instrument.
A worked example
A club that signs members to a Direct Debit agreement for membership, and asks for everything else to be paid separately, sets:
| Setting | Choice |
|---|---|
| Membership billing method | Direct Debit only |
| Require a mandate before activation | On |
| Allow paying membership invoices by card | Off |
| Club-initiated auto-charge | Neither |
| Member-initiated methods | Card, Instant bank payment |
The result: memberships can only be set up on Direct Debit and do not start until the mandate exists; the club never touches that mandate for anything else; and members pay race fees and kit by card or bank transfer at the moment they buy.
How it is enforced
The policy is applied in three places, so it holds even if someone tries to work around it:
- In the forms. The issue-membership wizard only offers methods the policy allows.
- In the API. Issuing a membership on a forbidden rail is refused outright, with the reason.
- At collection time. If a collection would break the policy, it is blocked rather than charged - even if the invoice was set up before the policy changed.
Changing the policy does not disturb what is already running: memberships stay as they are, and invoices already issued keep their settings. It governs what happens next.
What's next
- GoCardless and Stripe - connect the rails first.
- Invoices and charges - raising the one-off invoices this policy governs.
Membership changes
Freeze, switch, cancel and adjust the price of a member's membership - and understand exactly what each does to their access, billing and invoices.
Invoices and charges
Raise a one-off invoice, charge a whole squad at once with a bulk charge run, and take payment for race fees, kit and events.