Payments Overview

Selling software around the world shouldn't mean setting up a payment processor, registering for VAT in dozens of countries and fighting chargebacks on your own. When you sell through Moonbase, you don't have to: Moonbase is the merchant of record for your sales. We sell your products to your customers on your behalf, take the payment, charge and pay the right sales tax, and pay you out. This article explains what that means for you and for your customers.

Moonbase as merchant of record

Your customers buy from Moonbase, which resells your products. That's what lets us take care of payments and tax in every country you sell to. In practice:

• Checkout says the purchase is Sold and fulfilled by Moonbase AS (or Moonbase LLC for some US purchases), as a reseller of your products.

• Card statements show your account's address, <your-account-id>.moonbase.sh, shortened to 22 characters, and the receipt email explains that the charge is made in Moonbase's name. When a customer doesn't recognise a charge, this is usually why.

• There's nothing to connect: you don't need an account with Stripe, PayPal or anyone else. All you need is a bank account for your payouts (see Payout configuration).

• Your customers still come to you for help with what they bought, and replies to the emails they get from your store go to the email address under Account settings > Account.

Payment methods

Checkout offers each customer the payment methods that suit them, picked automatically from their currency, their country and the amount:

• cards, such as Visa, Mastercard and American Express;

• wallets, such as Apple Pay and Google Pay;

• local methods, such as PayPal, Klarna, iDEAL and Bancontact, where they're available.

You can't switch individual methods on or off: Moonbase shows each customer what works where they are. A few things to know:

• Subscriptions only offer methods that can be saved for renewals, so some local methods don't appear for them.

• Apple Pay and Google Pay only appear in the full-page checkout. With the storefront widget, checkout opens as an overlay on desktops and as a full page on phones (see the storefront widget documentation).

• Some methods, such as international cards and PayPal, carry an extra fee. Your account's fees are listed under Account settings > Account > Pricing Plan (see Fees & Costs).

What your customers see at checkout

Checkout has two steps. First, the customer gives their billing details: their email address (typed twice by new customers), their name and billing address, and whether it's a Personal purchase or a Business purchase. A business purchase adds a Business name and a Tax ID.

Then they pay. The payment step shows the order with its tax, a Coupon code field, the payment form and your terms. Depending on the customer, it can also show:

• Business purchase? Add a tax ID, when tax was charged, for a business buyer who didn't give one in the first step.

• A right-of-withdrawal checkbox for consumers in the EU and EEA: "I want immediate access and waive my 14-day right of withdrawal". Your products are delivered straight away, so the customer has to tick it before they can pay. Business buyers don't see it.

• A marketing checkbox, depending on the marketing consent you chose in Account features.

• Your EULA, if you've added one under Account settings > Account.

Free products skip the payment step and ask only for a name and email address. If you've switched on Captcha in Account features, free orders also show a "Verify you are human" check, which usually passes on its own. Paid checkouts never show it.

Checkout is in English, and the currency and quantity come from the cart or the link the customer followed.

Tax and VAT

Moonbase works out, collects and pays the VAT, GST and sales tax on every sale. You don't have to register for or file sales tax in your customers' countries. The one tax setting you have is whether the prices you set include tax.

Tax mode

Under Account settings > Payments, Tax mode has three options:

• Currency based (the default): follows what customers expect in each currency. EUR prices include tax, for example, while USD prices have tax added at checkout.

• Exclusive: all your prices are before tax, and tax is added on top at checkout.

• Inclusive: all your prices include tax, so customers pay exactly the price you set.

A change only applies to purchases made after it. With inclusive prices, the tax comes out of the price, so what you earn on a sale varies a little with the customer's country. With exclusive prices, you earn the same everywhere, and the customer's total varies instead.

Business customers and reverse charge

Consumers are always charged tax. A business that gives a valid tax ID isn't charged tax wherever the sale can be zero-rated (reverse charge): the tax shows as 0 at checkout and on its invoice. If a tax ID can't be validated, checkout says so, and the customer can correct it or buy as a personal purchase.

If a business forgot its VAT number, you can add it to the order within 14 days of the sale, and the tax is refunded to them. See Refunds, chargebacks and failed orders.

Receipts are invoices

Every completed order sends the customer a receipt email with a PDF invoice. It is a proper VAT invoice: the invoice number and date, the buyer with their tax ID, Moonbase as the seller with the tax number the tax was charged under, prices excluding tax, each tax with its rate, and the total. When a customer or their accountant asks for an invoice, open the order and click Download receipt, or choose Actions > Resend receipt.

Testing checkout before you go live

Until your account is live, checkout runs in demo mode. It's marked as a test order and takes no payment, but the order completes and licenses are delivered, so you can try the whole purchase and activation from start to finish. The receipt's subject starts with "[Test]", and test orders never reach a payout. See Going live: demo mode and verification.

Frequently asked questions

Why don't my customers see PayPal (or Klarna, or Apple Pay)?
Methods are picked for each customer's country, currency and amount, so not every method shows for everyone. Subscriptions only offer methods that can be saved for renewals, and Apple Pay and Google Pay only appear in the full-page checkout.

Do I need to connect Stripe or PayPal?
No. Moonbase takes the payments as merchant of record. Just set up your payout bank account.

A customer doesn't recognise a charge from Moonbase. What do I tell them?
Moonbase sells on your behalf, so the charge is in Moonbase's name, with your account's address on the statement. Their receipt email explains this as well.

A customer says checkout couldn't reach the payment provider.
The payment form couldn't load in their browser, usually because of a content blocker, a network that blocks it, or a browser built into another app. Another browser or network fixes it. Nothing is wrong with your store.

Can customers choose their currency or language?
Checkout is in English. The currency follows the customer's country, or the one in the link they followed: add ?currency= to a checkout link to set it.