Payment gateways

Connecting Stripe and/or PayPal so a customer can pay an invoice online instead of only by bank transfer or cheque — reached from Settings, in the Payments group.

When you would use this: setting up online payment for the first time, switching a gateway from test to live, or turning one off.

Stripe and PayPal, independently: each has its own panel, its own credentials, and its own on/off switch — enable one, both, or neither. A customer paying an invoice is offered whichever gateway or gateways your firm has switched on.

What you enter: your own account's API credentials from that provider (never the product's) — for PayPal, a client ID, client secret and webhook id; for Stripe, the equivalent keys. A secret you have already saved is never shown back to you in full; leaving its field blank when editing keeps what is already stored, typing into it replaces it.

Test mode: both gateways can be run in test mode against that provider's own sandbox, so you can send a real invoice through the full flow with a test card or a test PayPal account before taking real money.

Currencies: restrict a gateway to only the currencies your firm actually charges in, if you use more than one.

A narrower view: everyone who can read settings sees whether a gateway is connected; entering or changing its credentials needs the further finance-specific settings capability.

When it refuses: fields showing but not saving means you can see a gateway's configuration but not change it — ask an Owner or Admin. A customer's payment failing at the provider's own page is between them and that provider — check the account is live, not still in test mode, if this happens for everyone.