One of the most important questions you want to answer when setting up your organization is how to get paid by customers. This article walks you through what needs to be in place before the first payment clears.
Step 1: Connect a payment gateway
Before any invoice can be paid online, you need to connect a payment gateway. OfficeRnD supports a wide range of payment gateways, and you can integrate them into Flex.
Step 2: Create the services members pay for
Invoices are generated based on the services and plans you have set up in the system. If these don't exist, there is nothing to bill.
Billing Plans (memberships)
Billing plans allow you to sell services and memberships to your community:
Memberships are monthly subscriptions to recurring billing plans. This is the main way most spaces bill their members each month. Understand the difference between a plan and a membership →
Services like Day Passes are sold through one-off billing plans.
One-off fees (ad-hoc charges)
Use one-off fees for charges that don't repeat, such as a deposit, a printing fee, or an event ticket.
Resource Rates (bookable spaces)
For members to book meeting rooms, desks, or other resources through the Member Portal or Growth Hub, you need Resource Rates so that those bookings generate charges automatically. You can add hourly resource rates for meeting rooms, and daily resource rates for desks and event spaces.
To create resource rates:
Step 3: Add customers and fees
For payments and invoices to work properly, your organization needs a customer base and fees.
Ensure that you have set up and configured the following:
Customers:
Fees:
Step 4: Turn on automated invoicing
Even with a gateway and services configured, invoices won't be generated until automated invoice generation is enabled. Please note that if your account status is still in onboarding, you won't be able to enable the automated Bill Run; this functionality only becomes available once the account status is set to 'Active'.
Step 5: Set up billing automation (optional)
After you have configured the automatic Bill Run to generate invoices, you should configure whether they will be sent and charged automatically.
To configure your invoice settings:
Setting | What it does | Where to find it |
Automatic invoice sending | Invoices are sent to members automatically when generated. | On the Flex Amin Portal under Settings > Billing > Invoicing. |
Automatic payment collection | Charges the member's card on file when an invoice is due. | On the Flex Amin Portal under Settings > Billing > Invoicing. |
Pay Now button | Members can pay outstanding invoices from the Member Portal. | On the Member Portal and the mobile app, under Billing > Invoices. |
Step 6: Set up your storefront
Finally, don't forget to set up your Growth Hub storefront where customers can purchase services and day passes, and make bookings.
Best practices
Test with a small charge first. Before going live, create a test member with a real card and run a manual invoice to confirm the full payment flow works end to end.