How Portava billing works

This article is for the administrators who run an organisation's Portava portal.

In short

• Members pay you through Stripe; the money never passes through Portava.
• Portava invoices your organisation monthly in arrears, by email, with 14 days to pay.
• Connect Stripe under Settings, then Membership, then Card payments, before creating paid tiers.

Here is how Portava billing works, in plain language. There are two separate flows of money, and it helps to keep them apart.

Flow 1: Members paying your organisation

Members pay you directly through Stripe. Portava never holds the money. It lands in your own Stripe balance, and Stripe pays it out to your bank on the payout schedule you choose in your Stripe dashboard (usually a few days after each payment).

Portava takes a small platform fee from each membership or ticket payment. Stripe deducts this automatically at the moment of payment, so you never get a separate bill for it. Your rate is shown under Card payments in Membership settings.

A new member pays by card at a Stripe checkout page when they join. Stripe then renews them automatically every month or year, depending on the tier you set up.

If a member's renewal fails, Stripe retries the card itself. Portava does not cancel the membership. Members get a reminder email 30 days before renewal, and a receipt after each successful payment.

You can also record payments taken outside Stripe, such as bank transfer, cheque or cash. Those memberships expire 30 days after their end date if not renewed.

Flow 2: Portava billing your organisation

Nothing is charged when you sign up and there is no card to enter up front.

Portava bills monthly in arrears. On the 1st of each month, an invoice is raised for the month that just ended.

The invoice is emailed to your organisation's contact email, with 14 days to pay. It is not taken automatically from a card.

If an invoice goes unpaid, your account is flagged for the Portava team to follow up. Nothing is switched off automatically.

What you need to set up

1. Go to Settings, then Membership, and open Card payments. Click Connect Stripe. Stripe will ask for your business details, an identity check and a bank account. Portava does not collect any of this.
2. Come back to Card payments. It shows the connection status, whether payouts are enabled, and anything Stripe still needs before you can take payments.
3. Create your membership tiers under Tiers on the same page: price, monthly or yearly, and who they apply to. Free tiers are allowed.
4. If you are VAT registered, add your VAT number and rate in settings so prices and receipts show tax correctly.
5. Make sure your organisation has a contact email set. Portava uses it to send your monthly invoice.
6. Your country and currency are set by the Portava team when your account is created. Currency locks once you take your first payment, so check it before going live.

Two things worth knowing

If Stripe is not connected, paid tiers are hidden from joiners and no card payments can be taken. Memberships, invoices and overdue renewals are listed under Operations, then Billing, and a payment taken outside Stripe is recorded from the member's record with Record payment.

Cancelling a Stripe-backed membership from the admin panel currently only updates Portava, not Stripe. Cancel it in Stripe as well, or Stripe may keep charging until that gap is closed.