Online Payments

Online Payments lets your customers pay their invoices by card through a secure checkout, with the money settling directly into your own Stripe account. Breeze stays out of the middle: there’s no platform fee, no funds pass through us, and your business remains the merchant of record on your customer’s statement.

Online Payments builds on Invoices, so it is only available when the Service Management module is enabled for your account; see Service Management mode.

How It Works

You connect your Stripe account to Breeze once. After that, every issued invoice carries a durable customer link you can share with anyone, and customers can also pay from the Customer Portal. Payments collected online are recorded against the invoice automatically.

• You are the merchant of record. Your customer’s card statement shows your business, and you handle any chargebacks – not Breeze.
• No platform fee. You receive the full payment, less Stripe’s own processing fees. Breeze adds nothing.
• Card payments, hosted by Stripe. Customers complete checkout on Stripe’s secure hosted page; card details never touch Breeze.

Connecting Stripe

Connecting Stripe is a one-time setup, done once per partner. You paste a Stripe secret key from your Stripe dashboard, and Breeze uses it to create checkout sessions and read payment status directly against your account.

1. Go to Integrations → Accounting → Payments.
2. In your Stripe dashboard, copy a secret key – a standard secret key (sk_live… / sk_test…) or a restricted key (rk_live…).
3. Paste it into the Online payments card and click Save key. The card then shows your masked Stripe account, the key’s last 4 digits, and a Live / Test mode badge.

The card shows your current connection status and whether the key is live or test mode. Saving a key and disconnecting are sensitive billing actions – both require billing management permission and multi-factor authentication.

Note

One Stripe account connects per MSP partner. Until Stripe is connected, invoices show a quiet prompt to connect rather than a payment link.

See Accounting & Payments Integrations for the full connection walkthrough.

The Customer Invoice Link

Every issued invoice has its own private link that opens a view-and-pay page with no sign-in required. The same link is embedded in the invoice email and its PDF, so a customer who was emailed the invoice months ago can still open and pay it.

1. Open an issued invoice.
2. Click Copy invoice link to put the customer’s link on your clipboard. (This works whether or not Stripe is connected – without Stripe the page is view-and-download only.)
3. Share it however you like. The customer can read the invoice, download the PDF, and pay the amount due by card; the payment is recorded against the invoice automatically and badged Online.

The link stays valid for 12 months, or 180 days past the due date if that is later. If a link has gone to the wrong person, click Reset customer link – that revokes every link issued for the invoice so far, including the one already sitting in a sent email, and issues a fresh one.

A voided invoice’s link keeps working but shows a plain “this invoice was voided” page with no amounts and no payment option.

Paying from the Customer Portal

Customers who use the Customer Portal can view their issued invoices and pay any with an outstanding balance using a Pay now button, which opens the same secure Stripe Checkout. Once payment succeeds, the invoice’s balance and status update on their own.

Refunds

Refunds are reflect-only: you issue a refund from your own Stripe dashboard, and Breeze stays in sync automatically – the refunded amount is reflected back on the invoice. There’s no separate refund step inside Breeze.

Permissions

Connecting and disconnecting Stripe requires billing management permission plus multi-factor authentication. Copying or resetting an invoice’s customer link uses the same permission as issuing and sending invoices, and both actions are recorded in the audit log.

Charge now on an invoice, saving the partner Billing settings → Payments tab, saving an organization’s Billing tab when one of its own payment settings (automatic-payment limit, schedule, fees, payment methods or reminders) changes, and sending a client’s automatic-payment request to an address other than its billing contact each ask for a second-factor confirmation (an authenticator-app code or a passkey) for that exact invoice, those settings or that recipient. Saving an organization’s Billing tab without changing its payment settings, for example to edit only the tax ID or address, asks for nothing. These actions are available only from a signed-in user session, not from API keys. If your account has only text-message codes, add an authenticator app or passkey under your profile first.

Before an automatic payment is started, Breeze checks the invoice against the automatic-payment limit the client authorized and against your current limit, if lower. An invoice above either limit is not charged: nothing is created in Stripe, the planned charge is cancelled and the client is told it will not happen.

Caution

Your connected Stripe account can only charge in the currencies it supports. If a document is priced in a currency your Stripe account doesn’t handle, Breeze warns you on the invoice or quote rather than blocking your work – but the customer’s card payment will be declined at checkout with a plain “this invoice can’t be paid online” message. Fix it by enabling that currency in Stripe, or take payment another way and record it manually.

Related

• Invoices – send payment links from issued invoices
• Customer Portal – where customers view and pay online
• Recurring Contracts – auto-generated invoices can be paid online too

Restricted-key permissions

For existing invoice checkout, the key must read the Stripe account and Events and have Checkout Sessions write access. Breeze also checks the following permissions for automatic payments:

Stripe resource	Required access
Customers	Write
SetupIntents	Write
PaymentIntents	Write
PaymentMethods	Write
Mandates	Read

Saving or refreshing the key checks these permissions without creating a payment or saving a customer’s payment method. A missing automatic-payment permission does not disable existing card checkout. Automatic payments remain unavailable until every required permission is present and the feature is enabled for your partner account. Use Refresh after updating a restricted key’s permissions.

Automatic payments support Stripe accounts in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, European Economic Area, Australia and New Zealand. Bank-account debit requires a United States Stripe account and a USD invoice. Existing one-time invoice checkout remains card-only.

Processing fees

Processing fees are optional and apply to automatic payments only. One-time card pay links stay fee-free. The fee is added to the payment, never to the invoice balance, invoice PDF or accounting invoice.

In Billing settings → Payments, set a credit-card fee from 0 to 300 basis points (100 basis points = 1%) and a flat bank-payment fee from USD 0.00 to 25.00. Organization Billing settings can override either value. Blank inherits the partner default; zero exempts that organization.

A card fee remains inactive until a partner administrator affirms both statements: “I notified my acquirer (Stripe) and the card networks at least 30 days ago” and “this fee does not exceed my cost of card acceptance.” Breeze records the administrator and the time. Organization administrators cannot make this attestation for the partner.

Breeze’s conservative card-fee policy requires a US Stripe account, a USD invoice, a known US customer billing state and a credit card. Debit, prepaid and unknown-funding cards have no fee. No card fee is applied in CA, CT, ME or MA; Colorado is capped at 2%, and other supported states at 3%. Unknown geography and non-US accounts receive no card fee. Bank fees require US accounts and USD payments.

Customers see the applicable terms before saving a method, a confirmation after setup, the fee in each automatic-payment notice and principal/fee/total on their receipt. Rules are checked again before charging. The fee can decrease but cannot exceed the delivered notice. A change requiring a new notice postpones collection.

Your business remains responsible for ACH returns and Stripe return fees. Returns on individual bank accounts can arrive up to 60 days later. Stopping automatic payments cannot recall a debit already processing.

Refunds and disputes reverse principal and fee proportionally using cumulative totals. A full refund returns the full fee. A dispute reversal restores only the unrefunded share.

Under Integrations → accounting connection, choose the processing-fee income item (QuickBooks) or income account (Xero). Fees are exported separately when automatic payment push is enabled. Both providers require the configured payment/deposit account; Xero also requires the configured exempt tax code. Fee exports default to non-taxable; your business determines the appropriate tax treatment. Missing mapping or uncertain provider results remain visible for investigation and do not undo a successful customer payment.

Breeze is not legal advice. You are responsible for eligibility, required notices, acceptance-cost limits and tax treatment. Review your obligations before enabling fees.