Can't Transfer Amount to Connect Stripe Account

Question

BackGround:

What i'm trying to do is set-up a marketplace where the customer can acquire services of a seller,The Project is a MERN Stack Travel Application to be exact. What i would like is for the customer to Pay the Platform(My Website connected with Stripe) when he wishes to acquire a service e.g a hotel Room. The Customer stays at the hotel for the allotted time and when he checksout the platform keeps some of the customers amount as application fee and transfers the rest to the service provider,in this case the hotel.

Current Effort:

I Used STRIPE CONNECT to acheive the required functionality.

(Note: you guys don't need to see all of the code below just the heading and description would give you an idea of what i have done and what i'm trying to ask,but please do read the issue section)

i create a Connect account for the seller when he signs up on my Website

Create Connect Account

const express = require("express");
const router = express.Router();
  router.post("/createAccount", async (req, res) => {
  const { name, email } = req.body; //Data Passed from the FrontEnd
  stripe.accounts.create(
    {
      type: "custom",
      country: "US",
      email: email,
      requested_capabilities: ["card_payments", "transfers"],
    },
    function (err, account) {
      res.json({ account: account });
    }
  );
});

When the Seller Provides the rest of the required details(including bank Account) after logging-in to the Seller Portal i create a bank_account,update the already created Connect Account and link the bank_account with the Connect Account (Hopefully, that somehow makes sense)

Create Bank Account

  router.post("/createBankAccount", async (req, res) => {
  const { account_holder_name, routing_number, account_number } = req.body;
  stripe.tokens.create(
    {
      bank_account: {
        country: "US",
        currency: "USD",
        account_holder_name,
        account_holder_type: "individual",
        routing_number,
        account_number,
      },
    },
    function (err, token) {
      res.send(token);
    }
  );
});

Update Account:

  router.post("/updateAccount", async (req, res) => {
      const {
        AccountID,
        Day,
        Month,
        Year,
        first_name,
        last_name,
        email,
        BankAccountID,
      } = req.body;

      const FrontFilePath = fs.readFileSync("PathToFileHere");
      const FrontPhotoIDUpload = await stripe.files.create({
        file: {
          data: FrontFilePath,
          name: "FrontPhotoID.jpg",
          type: "application.octet-stream",
        },
        purpose: "identity_document",
      });

      const BackFilePath = fs.readFileSync("PathToFileHere");
      const BackPhotoIDUpload = await stripe.files.create({
        file: {
          data: BackFilePath,
          name: "BackPhotoID.jpg",
          type: "application.octet-stream",
        },
        purpose: "identity_document",
      });

      stripe.accounts.update(
        AccountID,
        {
          business_type: "individual",
          individual: {
            dob: { day: Day, month: Month, year: Year },
            first_name: first_name,
            last_name: last_name,
            id_number: "006-20-8311",
            phone: "605-628-6049",
            address: {
              city: "Half Way",
              line1: "2467  Twin House Lane",
              postal_code: "65663",
              state: "MO",
            },
            email,
            ssn_last_4: "8311",
            verification: {
              document: {
                front: FrontPhotoIDUpload.id,
                back: BackPhotoIDUpload.id,
              },
            },
          },
          business_profile: {
            mcc: "4722",
            url: "http://www.baoisne.com",
          },
          tos_acceptance: {
            date: Math.floor(Date.now() / 1000),
            ip: req.connection.remoteAddress, 
          },
        },
        function (err, account) {
          console.log(err);
          console.log(account);
        }
      );
     //Connect External Account
      stripe.accounts.createExternalAccount(
        AccountID,
        {
          external_account: BankAccountID,
        },
        function (err, bankAccount) {
          console.log(err);
          res.send(bankAccount);
        }
      );
    });

Then when the customers provides his account details i charge the customer,keep some money as application fee and move the rest to the Service Providers Connect account.

Charge Customer

  router.post("/charge", async (req, res) => {
  const { TokenID, CustomerID, Amount, AccountID } = req.body;
  let PaymentAmount = Amount * 100;
  let application_fee_amount = 400;
  try {
    const payment = await stripe.paymentIntents.create({
      amount: PaymentAmount,
      currency: "USD",
      description: "We did it boss",
      payment_method_data: {
        type: "card",
        card: {
          token: TokenID,
        },
      },
      receipt_email: "abdullahabid427@gmail.com",
      customer: CustomerID,
      application_fee_amount,
      transfer_data: {
      destination: AccountID,
      },
      confirm: true,
    });
    return res.status(200).json({
      confirm: "Payment Succeeded",
    });
  } catch (error) {
    console.log(error);
    return res.status(400).json({
      message: error.message,
    });
  }
});

By doing the above procedure a connect account is created and the amount is moved into the connected account.

Issue

The Above procedure although works correctly, it moves the amount into the Connected Service Provider Account directly after the customer is charged, what i would like is for the customer to pay the platform and after the Service Provider has provided his services , the Platform pays the Service Provider, i thought about removing

  application_fee_amount,
  transfer_data: {
  destination: AccountID,
  }

the above parameters in the Charge or Stripe.paymentIntents.create endpoint, and after Service Provider has completed his services i transfer the amount using the Stripe Transfer API

router.post("/transfer", async (req, res) => {
  try {
    console.log("TRANSFER=");
    const { AccountID, amount } = req.body;
    const transfer = await stripe.transfers.create({
      amount,
      currency: "USD",
      destination: AccountID,
    });
    res.send(transfer);
  } catch (error) {
    res.send(error);
  }
});

the issue here is that transfer endpoint returns "Your destination account needs to have at least one of the following capabilities enabled: transfers, legacy_payments" , i have checked the Connected Account in Stripe Dashboard and in the Capabilities section Card_Payment and Transfers are both set to Active, plus Payments and Payouts are both Enabled and the status of the connect account is "Complete"

So if anyone could point in the right direction i would really Appreciate it,Cheers :)

user_4016831 · Answer

Ok - we'll agree that Stripe works as intended. You get the error message that you get because you remove the destination account ID from the payment intent creating function. That's where the problem lies, under your heading Charge Customer.

Let's look at it: (a shortened version)

const payment = await stripe.paymentIntents.create({
  amount: PaymentAmount,
  currency: "USD",
  ...
  customer: CustomerID,
  application_fee_amount,
  transfer_data: {
    destination: AccountID,
  },
  confirm: true,
});

The last property confirm: true is equivalent to creating and confirming the payment intent in the same call. The default value is false -- using that the status of the newly created payment intent will be requires_confirmation. And when you're ready, you confirm the payment intent along these lines:

const confirmedPayment = await stripe.paymentIntents.confirm(
    'payment_intent_id',
    {payment_method: 'card'},
    function(err, paymentIntent) {

    }
});

A few general comments on things going wrong

When a payer pays money for some goods online, it is the responsibility of the app developer to implement the logic, according to which the money and goods are sent and received: it can be prepaid, postpaid, or partially both. No logic is foolproof. In general, if we worry about customers taking advantage of our payment policy, we can require everything to be prepaid by all paying parties and include a fair refund policy. In this case, Stripe supports refunds of payment intents but what's more important: it keeps track of the status of the payment.

When the payment intent is created but not confirmed, the status is requires_confirmation. Not much can go wrong there. But after the payment intent has been confirmed, the status will be processing - this may take days. You may decide to cancel the payment at any time. But if things go fine, the status will change to succeeded which means that the funds are in the destination account. But if the payment fails for whatever reason, the status will return to requires_payment_method. Even in this case, there's no need to create a new payment or transfer object. You can retrieve the payment intent any time by calling stripe.retrievePaymentIntent(clientSecret) and check the status. But in my opinion, it's much easier to monitor the status changes with a webhook that is configured to receive the status changing events. Even if no action takes place immediately when the status changes, we can store the status in the DB where it's available.

From experience, I've seen how common it is for payments to fail. It doesn't mean that there's any fraud going on on either side but it does mean that the app should be prepared to handle both cases. The events to add to the webhook config are payment_intent.succeeded and payment_intent.payment_failed. How these events are handled is specific to each and every application.

user_4016831 · Answer

Create a webhook (Stripe config) which includes:

Events sent to the webhook: in this case customer.created, customer.source.created, customer.source.updated
URL = the route that handles the events when they arrive

So you need to store the pending payment in your DB first. Then in the webhook, find it in the DB and complete the transfer.

Can't Transfer Amount to Connect Stripe Account

2 Answers