Payments & Billing

Busted

• 3-D Secure authentication / Strong Customer AuthenticationThe issuer checking that the real cardholder is paying: silent from device signals most of the time, a code or app tap when it wants more proof.
• Account updaterA service that refreshes stored card details after expiry or bank reissue so recurring payments do not fail on stale credentials.
• ACH debit authorization / SEPA Direct Debit mandateThe customer's recorded permission for a business to pull one or more payments from their bank account.
• Acquirer (acquiring bank)The merchant-side institution that accepts card transactions, routes them to the card networks, and receives settlement for the seller.
• Authorization and captureTwo steps, not one: the bank reserves the money on the card first, then you actually take it. The gap is why 'pending' charges appear and vanish.
• Billing cycle anchorThe fixed date every invoice lines up to, no matter when someone signed up. Move it and all renewals shift to the same day.
• Buy now, pay later (BNPL)Third-party checkout financing that lets the customer split a purchase into installments while the provider handles repayment.
• Cancel at period endCancel now, but keep access until the paid period runs out. The renewal just never happens, and nothing is refunded.
• Card testing attackBots firing stolen card numbers at your checkout in tiny amounts to find which ones still work. The fees and fines are yours.
• Card vaulting / card-on-file credential / tokenizationLetting your payment provider hold the real card and handing you a token to charge later, so card numbers never touch your servers.
• Chargeback (dispute)The cardholder asks their bank to reverse a charge, and the money gets yanked back from you, plus a fee, agree or not.
• Connected accounts and split paymentsA marketplace collects a customer payment, sends the seller's share to their account, and keeps a platform fee.
• Credit noteA new document that reduces or cancels an invoice without editing the invoice that was already issued.
• Customer billing portalA self-serve page where customers change plan, swap the card on file, cancel, and grab invoices without emailing you.
• Deferred revenue / revenue recognitionPrepaid money starts as a liability, then becomes revenue over the period when the product or service is actually delivered.
• Deposit / partial paymentCollect part of the total upfront, then keep the remaining invoice balance open until its later due date.
• DunningThe automated nag sequence after a payment fails: retries, emails, and in-app banners chasing a working card before you cut access.
• Entitlements (feature gating)The machine-readable list of what a customer's plan actually unlocks, so your code checks capabilities instead of plan names.
• Express checkout / wallet buttonThe one-tap pay buttons above the card form that pull card, name, and address from a wallet the customer already has.
• Grace periodA short window after payment failure or subscription expiry when the customer keeps access while they fix the problem.
• Grandfathered pricing / price versioningExisting customers stay attached to an old price version while a new price applies to later signups.
• Hosted checkout vs embedded checkoutSend the buyer to the payment company's page, or mount their card fields inside yours. Same money, different branding, different PCI paperwork.
• Hybrid pricingOne subscription combines a predictable fixed platform fee with a variable charge for metered usage.
• Instant payoutA fee-paid, on-demand transfer that sends eligible available balance to a supported debit card without waiting for the normal payout day.
• Interchange feeThe card fee passed through the merchant's acquirer to the customer's card issuer, separate from network and processor charges.
• InvoiceAn itemized bill that tells a customer what they owe, why they owe it, when it is due, and whether it has been paid.
• Involuntary churnSubscribers lost to a dead card rather than a decision. They never cancelled, the payment just stopped working.
• Issuer (issuing bank)The cardholder's bank: it issued the card and decides whether each card payment is approved or declined.
• KYB onboarding / payment facilitator modelThe business verification and underwriting needed before a platform can let a seller take payments or receive payouts.
• Merchant accountThe acquiring account through which a seller accepts card payments before the proceeds are paid out to its regular bank account.
• Merchant of record (MoR)A payment company that legally sells your product for you, so the sales tax filings and the dispute paperwork sit on their side of the line.
• Net terms invoicingDeliver the work, send the bill, get paid in 30 days. The invoice is a promise, not a payment.
• Network tokenA card-network-issued substitute for a card number that can stay usable when the physical card expires or is reissued.
• Off-session payment / merchant-initiated transaction (MIT)Charging a saved card when the customer is not at the checkout: renewals, usage bills, and no-show fees fire from your side, not theirs.
• OverageThe charge for going past what your plan includes. First 10,000 calls are covered, call 10,001 costs extra.
• Partial capture / void / refundThree ways to unwind a charge: capture less than you held, void it before it settles, or refund it after. The clock decides which you get.
• Pay by bank (open banking payment)A checkout payment sent directly from the customer's bank account instead of through a card network.
• Payment gatewayThe secure checkout bridge that carries payment details from your site to the system that asks the customer's bank for approval.
• Payment linkA URL that opens a ready-made checkout for a set product or amount. Paste it in a message or a QR code and get paid without building anything.
• Payment orchestration and routingA control layer that sends each transaction to the best available processor for cost, approval rate, or uptime.
• Payment processorThe transaction engine that passes approvals, captures, refunds, and other payment messages between merchants and the card system.
• Payment reconciliation / double-entry ledgerMaking your books agree with the processor: every payout matched to the charges, fees, refunds and disputes inside it.
• Payment service provider (PSP)The vendor that plugs card payments into your site: it takes the card, gets the bank's yes or no, and moves the money into your account.
• Preauthorization hold / incremental authorizationReserve an estimated card amount now, then raise that same hold as the final bill grows before collecting it.
• Prepaid credits (credit burndown)Customers buy a balance upfront and usage eats it down. Like an arcade card: no bill at the end, just a number falling toward zero.
• Presentment currency vs settlement currencyThe currency charged to the customer versus the currency in which the payment provider settles the merchant's funds.
• ProrationCharging only for the slice of the billing period actually used, so a mid-cycle plan change costs the difference, not a full month.
• Representment (dispute evidence)Submitting targeted proof through your payment provider to contest a chargeback and try to recover the disputed money.
• Rolling reserveA payment provider withholds part of each payout for a period as a buffer against future disputes, refunds, or losses.
• Seat-based billing and true-upPer-user pricing that reconciles the billed quantity when seats are added or removed during a subscription term.
• Settlement / payout scheduleThe gap between 'the charge succeeded' and 'the money is in my bank'. Settlement moves the funds, the payout schedule sets the date.
• Smart retries (decline recovery)Re-attempting a failed charge when it is most likely to work, keyed on the decline reason and payday timing, instead of hammering it daily.
• Soft decline vs hard declineA soft decline means 'try again later' (no funds, bank glitch). A hard decline means 'stop asking' (stolen, closed, invalid).
• Statement descriptorThe short merchant name printed on a card statement. Get it wrong and your own customers report you as fraud.
• Subscription billingCharging a saved card on a repeating schedule for as long as the plan lasts, with renewals, plan changes, and failures handled automatically.
• Subscription lifecycleThe state machine behind a subscription as it moves through trial, activation, renewal, pause, cancellation, and reactivation.
• Tax-inclusive vs tax-exclusive pricingTax-inclusive prices already contain tax; tax-exclusive prices have tax added on top when the final amount is calculated.
• Usage-based (metered) billingPrice scales with what people actually consume. You meter the calls, tokens, or gigabytes, then bill the total at period end.

The territory

30 core terms mapped for this field, ranked by how often builders reach for them. Each one is a future entry. Want to bust one? One entry, one file, one pull request.

• merchant of record (MoR)third party legally sells your product, owns tax and chargebacks"someone else handles my sales tax and refunds" · "the reseller-style payment company"
• payment service provider (PSP)the vendor that authorizes cards and moves money for you"the Stripe-type thing" · "the company that actually takes the card"
• subscription billingautomated recurring charges tied to an ongoing plan or contract"charge them every month automatically" · "the recurring payment thing"
• hosted checkout vs embedded checkoutpayment page on their domain versus fields inlined in yours"redirect them to pay or keep them on my site" · "the drop-in card box"
• payment linkshareable URL that collects a one-off or recurring payment"a link I can text someone to pay me" · "no-code invoice link"
• authorization and capturereserve funds first, take them later as a separate step"hold the card now, charge on delivery" · "two-step charge"
• partial capture / void / refundthree different ways to unwind or reduce a charge"give back only part of the money" · "cancel the charge before it settles"
• idempotency keyunique token so a retried charge request never double-bills"stop it charging twice if the button is clicked twice" · "safe retry ID"
• dunningautomated sequence that chases a failed or overdue payment"the emails when their card bounces" · "payment recovery flow"
• soft decline vs hard declinetemporary retryable failure versus permanent do-not-retry refusal"should I retry this card or give up" · "the decline that means try again later"
• involuntary churncustomers lost to expired or declined cards, not intent"they didn't cancel, their card just died" · "accidental churn"
• smart retries (decline recovery)retiming failed charges by decline reason and payday patterns"retry the card at a smarter time" · "auto re-attempt failed payments"
• prorationmid-cycle plan change priced by the fraction of period used"only charge for the days they actually used" · "partial-month math"
• usage-based (metered) billingprice scales with measured consumption, invoiced in arrears"charge per API call" · "pay for what you use"
• prepaid credits (credit burndown)customer buys a balance upfront, usage draws it down"token packs like OpenAI" · "wallet that depletes"
• overagecharges for consumption beyond the plan's included allowance"what they pay after they blow past the limit" · "extra usage fee"
• entitlements (feature gating)machine-readable map of what a paying customer may access"which features unlock on which plan" · "the paywall check in code"
• billing cycle anchorfixed date all invoices align to regardless of signup day"everyone gets billed on the 1st" · "reset the renewal date"
• cancel at period endsubscription stays active until paid term expires, then stops"let them keep it until the month runs out" · "soft cancel"
• customer billing portalself-serve page to change plan, card, or download invoices"let them update their own card" · "where they get their receipts"
• chargeback (dispute)cardholder reverses a charge through their bank, with a fee"they went to their bank instead of asking me" · "forced refund"
• 3-D Secure authentication / Strong Customer Authenticationissuer-side step-up challenge that shifts fraud liability off you"the extra bank verification popup" · "the OTP screen during payment" · "3DS / SCA"
• card vaulting / card-on-file credential / tokenizationstoring a reusable payment token instead of raw card data"save their card for next time" · "keep the card without storing it"
• off-session payment / merchant-initiated transaction (MIT)charging a saved card while the customer isn't present"bill them automatically in the background" · "merchant-initiated charge"
• express checkout / wallet buttonone-tap payment using a stored device or browser wallet"the Apple Pay button at checkout" · "one-tap pay"
• statement descriptorthe merchant text shown on the customer's card statement"what shows up on their bank statement" · "so they don't think it's fraud"
• card testing attackbots hammering checkout with stolen cards to find live ones"hundreds of tiny failed charges overnight" · "carding my checkout"
• settlement / payout schedulewhen captured funds actually land in your bank account"why isn't the money in my account yet" · "the T+2 delay"
• payment reconciliation / double-entry ledgermatching processor payouts, fees, and refunds to your own records"make my numbers match Stripe's" · "why the payout doesn't equal the sales"
• net terms invoicingsend an invoice now, payment due in 30/60 days"invoice now, get paid in 30 days" · "bill the client and wait"

Deeper in the field

• invoice itemized payment request containing amounts, due date, and payment status
• payment gateway securely transmits checkout payment data to a processor or acquirer
• payment processor processes transaction messages between merchants, networks, acquirers, and issuers
• acquirer (acquiring bank) institution that accepts card transactions on the merchant's behalf
• issuer (issuing bank) cardholder's bank that approves or declines a card transaction
• merchant account acquiring account through which a merchant receives card proceeds
• subscription lifecycle trial, activation, renewal, pause, cancellation, and reactivation states
• grace period continued access window after payment failure or subscription expiration
• network token card-network-issued credential that survives reissued or expired cards
• account updater service that refreshes stored card numbers when banks reissue them
• preauthorization hold / incremental authorization reserved amount that can be raised before final capture
• credit note document that reduces or cancels an already-issued invoice
• deposit / partial payment upfront portion collected before the remaining invoice balance becomes due
• ACH debit authorization / SEPA Direct Debit mandate customer authorization to pull funds from a bank account
• pay by bank (open banking payment) account-to-account transfer at checkout, bypassing card rails
• buy now, pay later (BNPL) installment financing offered at checkout by a third party
• representment (dispute evidence) submitting proof to contest and win back a chargeback
• rolling reserve processor withholds a percentage of volume against future disputes
• interchange fee fee paid through the acquirer to the card issuer
• presentment currency vs settlement currency customer charge currency versus the merchant's payout currency
• tax-inclusive vs tax-exclusive pricing whether tax is included in or added to the displayed price
• payment orchestration and routing routing transactions across multiple processors for cost or uptime
• connected accounts and split payments platform pays sellers a share while keeping a fee
• KYB onboarding / payment facilitator model verifying business identity before enabling payouts on a platform
• instant payout fee-paid immediate transfer of balance to a debit card
• deferred revenue / revenue recognition recognizing prepaid income across the period it's earned
• seat-based billing and true-up per-user pricing reconciled when seat count changes mid-term
• hybrid pricing fixed platform fee plus metered usage in one subscription
• grandfathered pricing / price versioning existing customers keep old pricing after a public price change