You Can Now Bring Your Own Merchant Account

Over the last year I have been asked many times what it would take to allow organizations to bring their own merchant account. It was a good idea whose implications were complex enough that asking about it might have been a good way to nerd snipe me. Finally after enough customer demand I decided to get started and it was exactly as involved as I thought it would be, but the good news is that it's done now.

Different organizations have different needs when it comes to getting a merchant account. Stripe integration as it has worked before is still available. Today we are adding Authorize.Net payment gateway support for larger organizations with enough volume to justify shopping around for better merchant rates with companies that recognize the unique risk profile of aviation.

Migrating

Adding support for multiple gateways has required some design changes and there were some new data structures that needed to be populated with existing data. If you were already using Stripe for credit card payments then this has already been done for you and Stripe has been selected as your default payment gateway.

If you have stripe already and want to add another gateway or if you only have Authorize.Net you can easily add a gateway by opening "Org Settings" -> "Payment Gateways" in your organization menu. When you add a gateway you will need to provide your Login Id and Transaction Key as required by the Authorize.Net API. Your gateway authentication credentials are then validated and stored securely and your account is ready to use.

If you have multiple payment gateways or if you are setting up your first payment gateway be sure to select a default payment gateway for your organization by opening "Org Settings" -> "Configuration" and selecting your default payment gateway in the "Billing" section of the configuration page. If you want to test your gateway with one new user while everyone else stays on your old gateway you can override the payment gateway on individual members using the admin version of the Edit Member page.

Getting Started

If you want to get started with Authorize.Net gateway support or if you think you're ready to create and organization for your partnership, club, or school we're happy to help get your organization set up, just email [email protected].