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How to take money with what you build: card payments in an online shop with « Connect Stripe », more payment methods, and what to do for other sites.

Updated 3 min read
On this page
  1. The fastest route: an online shop
  2. More payment methods, without code
  3. Prices and currency
  4. Other sites: bookings, services, memberships
  5. Who receives the money?
  6. Related

Most people who build with FromScratch want, sooner or later, to be paid: for products, bookings or services. This page gives you the big picture and points you to the detailed guides. The short version: online shops have card payments built in through Stripe, and the money goes straight to your own Stripe account — FromScratch never holds it.

The fastest route: an online shop

If you sell products, start from the E-commerce site template on the Home page and pick one of the four designs (MAISON, Oaklane, Velour or Kinetic). You get a real shop with a cart, a checkout, customer accounts, orders and a store admin. See Create an online store.

A new shop starts in a safe mode: customers can place orders, but no payment is taken (« Manual Payment »). That is useful while you set things up and test the checkout. When you are ready to accept cards:

  1. Open your shop project and click Payments in the top bar. The panel is called Card payments.
  2. Click Connect Stripe. You sign in to your own Stripe account (or create one) on Stripe's site, then come back to FromScratch.
  3. The panel shows Stripe connected, then « Turning it on in the shop… (about a minute) ».
  4. When it reads « Card payment is offered at the shop's checkout. », try a purchase in the preview.
  5. Click Republish so the live shop takes payments too.

Tip

while your Stripe account is in test mode, pay with the card 4242 4242 4242 4242, any future expiry date and any CVC. No real money moves.

The full walkthrough, including the manual alternative with your own API keys, is in Take payments in your store.

More payment methods, without code

Your shop's checkout uses Stripe's payment form, which shows the methods your Stripe account has switched on. To offer more (for example PayPal, Klarna, iDEAL or Apple Pay, depending on what Stripe supports for your country and currency), turn them on in your Stripe dashboard — there is nothing to change in FromScratch. Shops created before this payment form was introduced keep a card-only form, which still works.

Note

Stripe does not support businesses in every country (for example, it does not onboard Tunisian businesses). Local payment gateways are not built into FromScratch.

Prices and currency

Shops use EUR by default. You can switch the store to another currency by asking the agent; it updates the store, the region and the shipping prices, then sets your product prices in the new currency (existing prices are not converted automatically). See Currency and shipping.

Other sites: bookings, services, memberships

Sites that are not built on the shop template (a booking site, a SaaS landing page, a course site…) have no built-in payment button. You can still ask the agent to add one. The rules that keep you safe:

  • Put secret keys in the Variables menu (« Environment variables »), never in the chat. See Environment variables.
  • Test with your provider's test keys before switching to live keys.
  • Republish after every change so the live site follows.
Example prompt
On my booking page, add a "Pay a 20 € deposit" button that sends people to Stripe Checkout. I've put my Stripe test keys in Variables as STRIPE_API_KEY and STRIPE_PUBLISHABLE_KEY.

Warning

never paste an API key, password or token into the chat. The Variables menu exists so secrets never end up in the conversation history.

Who receives the money?

With Connect Stripe, you sign in to your own Stripe account: customers' payments go to that account, and refunds, payouts and disputes are handled in your Stripe dashboard. Your FromScratch subscription is a separate thing, billed to you by FromScratch.

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