Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA)

Table of Contents

• Supported Countries
• Payment Experience
• SEPA Mandate
• Subscription Rebills
• Refunds and Chargebacks
• Webhooks

The Single Euro Payments Area is an EU initiative to create a single market for euro-denominated payments. You can collect direct debit payments from accounts within the supported countries. 

SEPA Direct Debit is a pull-based payment, thus FastSpring’s bank initiates the payment collection. The consumer must accept a mandate that authorizes FastSpring to debit their account. FastSpring automatically generates this mandate, and presents it to customers at checkout.

To ensure a consumer has sufficient funds at the time of payment, FastSpring routes all transactions through a third-party bank verification. Please allow 48 hours for a consumer’s order to be fulfilled. 

Supported Countries

FastSpring currently supports SEPA payments for transactions between € 2 and € 2,000 from consumers in the following countries:

• Austria
• Germany

FastSpring only displays SEPA as a payment option to customers in these countries. If the contents of their order exceed the € 2,000 limit, or if your storefront does not accept Euro-denominated transactions, FastSpring will not display the SEPA payment option.

Payment Experience

The SEPA payment method is automatically enabled in all Storefronts that support Euros. Customers based in the supported countries may purchase any product or subscription with SEPA. 

At checkout, customers follow the steps below to pay using SEPA:

1. The consumer selects SEPA Direct Debit, and enters their bank name, bank code, or IBAN to log in to their bank account. 
2. The consumer agrees to the SEPA Direct Debit Mandate terms, and verifies their bank information to submit the order. 
3. The consumer is redirected to an order confirmation page, confirming that the payment is complete. 
4. Payments typically take 48 hours to process. When the payment is fully processed, FastSpring sends the fulfillment. 

SEPA Mandate

The SEPA Direct Debit Mandate is a billing agreement that allows you to collect future payments from a consumer’s bank account. The consumer provides this agreement with the following information:

• Payment Amount
• SEPA Mandate ID
• SEPA Mandate Date
• FastSpring Seller Name
• FastSpring Order Amount
• Product Name
• Creditor Information
• FastSpring Support Contact Information
• SEPA Prenote

If the customer is purchasing a subscription, the mandate should also include subscription billing terms. 

You can access the SEPA Mandate in the order’s details page, or the Fulfillments page. Customers can access it from their invoice, fulfillment email, and Account Management Portal. 

Subscription Rebills

SEPA supports automatic billing for subscriptions. If the associated mandate includes subscription terms, FastSpring can automatically rebill customers when appropriate. You do not need a separate mandate for each rebill. 

Declined Rebills

If a subscription rebill is declined, FastSpring automatically cancels the subscription and notifies the customer. They may add a new payment method through their Account Management Portal prior to deactivation. However, they can no longer use SEPA for that subscription. 

Refunds and Chargebacks

SEPA entitles consumers to “no-questions-asked refunds” up to 8 weeks (56 days) after payment. If they request a refund in that timeframe, their bank will immediately credit them the full refund. Then, the bank will notify FastSpring of the chargeback with a reason code. FastSpring will deduct this from your account. 

For unauthorized transactions, consumers can make a claim and submit supporting evidence to their bank within 13 months of the transaction. 

Webhooks

FastSpring sends the following webhooks for SEPA transactions:

• order.completed: Sent following a successful SEPA transaction. 
• order.canceled: Sent following a canceled transaction.
• order.failed: Sent if the information fails an account check, and FastSpring cancels the transaction.