This page is your hub for understanding the payments industry and learning how Chargent implements industry-standard payment processes. We also recommend you check out the Chargent Terminology page, which will help you easily navigate payment industry acronyms and technical terms.
Transaction Types #
Chargent takes care of all your payment-related actions. You can initiate and track the following Transaction Types in Chargent:
- Authorizations
- Charges
- Voids
- Refunds
Chargent creates or updates a transaction record for each transaction type above. To learn more, check out Chargent Transactions Tab.
Payment Method Types #
If you accept multiple payment types, Chargent’s got you covered. Depending on your gateway, you can process credit card and bank account transactions (also known as direct debit or ACH transactions). Additionally, using our Payment Methods feature, you can save and store customer payment methods for later use.
For more details on these types of transactions, please review Understanding Credit Card Payments or Understanding Bank Account Payments.
For more information on the Payment Methods feature, see Payment Methods Supported or Setting Up Payment Methods.
Transaction Settlement #
Settlement describes when funds are transferred from the cardholder’s account to the merchant’s. Generally, time is required to verify the payment information via a clearing process before settlement. This process can occur quickly, as with credit card transactions, or it can take time, which is typical of bank account transactions.
For more details on this process, see Understanding Transaction Settlement.
Tokenization #
Tokenization is the industry-standard method for organizations to process credit card transactions safely. All cardholder data is kept secure by encrypting it in a manner that cannot be decrypted. Chargent’s tokenization process stores cardholder data in tokens never stored in Salesforce. Instead, these tokens are only available to the payment gateway for a merchant.
For more information on tokenization, please see Understanding Tokenization.
Authorizations and Captures #
An authorization is a type of transaction that checks if a credit card is valid for a future charge or places a hold on an amount. Run an authorization if you want to hold a portion of the available balance on a card to capture in the future without pulling the funds at the time of authorization.
See Understanding Authorizations for more details.
Gateway Responses #
Chargent creates a transaction record for all payments based on the gateway’s response to a request, even those that were declined or in error. For example, a transaction might be declined if the card is expired or in error due to missing billing information. Chargent includes multiple fields to capture the response from your gateway.
The Response Status field on the transaction record will provide the result of the attempted transaction, such as whether or not it was approved or declined, or in error. See Understanding Response Statuses for more information.
You can dive deeper into the response by viewing the Response Code and Gateway Response fields on the transaction record. Response code information is specific to your gateway. Check out Understanding Response Codes for links to your gateway’s response codes.
Refunds and Voids #
Refunds and voids are both designed to reverse a transaction. Whether you process a refund or void depends on whether the transaction has already settled. A void is designed to cancel a charge or authorization before it has settled, whereas a refund is designed to apply a credit to a transaction that has already settled. You can also use the Void button to cancel a refund if it was accidentally processed and has not yet settled.
See Refunding and Voiding Transactions for more details.
Cash and Paper Checks #
All your payments are important, so Chargent has an easy way for you to store cash and paper check payments. While cash and paper check transactions are not processed through your gateway, you can verify you have received the funds and add them to Chargent so that all Chargent reports reflect all payments received.
See Entering Cash And Paper Checks for more information.
Unresolved Transactions #
When Chargent cannot update or save a transaction, a record is displayed on the Unresolved Transactions tab. Unresolved transactions can occur for various reasons, such as conflicts related to validation rules, triggers, or other Salesforce configurations. Ultimately, they exist to help you investigate and fix any automation or customizations that caused them.
See Understanding Unresolved Transactions to learn more.
Credits and Unlinked Refunds #
Some gateways allow you to send credits to a checking account when a transaction is not a refund of a previous payment. You can also send funds to a credit card or bank account that is not a refund for a previous charge, a type of transaction called unlinked refunds.
For more information, see Sending Credits and Sending Unlinked Refunds.
Currencies #
Chargent supports transactions in more than 150 different currencies. Chargent also supports customers who take payments in multiple currencies. Your payment gateway will ultimately determine what currencies you can process.
For more information, see Understanding Currencies.
Billing Addresses #
The integration between Salesforce and your gateway provider relies on a handful of Billing Address fields. Because every gateway is different, Chargent is designed to handle the mapping and conversion of your billing data, allowing you to focus on taking payments and not spend time mastering the nuances of abbreviations or ISO codes.
For more information, see Billing Address Fields.
Address Verification System (AVS) #
The Address Verification System (AVS) prevents fraud by validating the ownership of a credit card using the billing address of a credit card and matching it with the data on file at the credit card issuing company. You have a wide variety of options available to use AVS for handling transactions that should be declined or approved based on matches of the AVS data.
See Address Verification System (AVS) for details on how this works and why you should use it.
Credit Card Numbers #
Credit card numbers are formatted based on industry standards. The first few digits of a credit card indicate whether it is a Visa, Mastercard, American Express, or Discover Card. The first six to eight digits identify the bank that issued the card, and the last digit is a check-digit, used to detect errors. The remaining digits (usually nine) are the cardholder’s account number.
For more details, please review Understanding Credit Card Payments.
Card Verification Number (Security Code) #
Card verification numbers are used to reduce credit card fraud in ‘card-not-present’ transactions (e-commerce or phone, where the physical card is not being swiped). Card verification codes help you reduce the scope of your PCI compliance.
Review Understanding Credit Card Payments before launching a data migration.
