Payers are the individuals or businesses that send funds to you.
A payer represents the source of incoming payments, including their identity details, contact information, and associated payment methods or activity.
By creating and managing payers, you can reuse information, reduce friction, and improve reconciliation across payment flows.
Why use payers
Using payers allows you to:
- Store payer details once and reuse them across payment requests
- Prefill payment experiences to reduce friction
- Associate payment methods for future use
- Track payment activity at the payer level
- Improve reconciliation of incoming funds
How payers work
Payers can be created and used in multiple ways depending on your workflow.
Create directly
Create a payer via API or the Console by providing identity and contact details.
This is useful when:
- You already know the payer
- You want to reuse payer information across payments
Collect during payment
If a payer is not predefined, their details can be collected during a:
- Payment request
- Tokenization request
The payer is created or updated automatically once details are submitted.
Associate with virtual accounts
Payers can be linked to virtual accounts to improve reconciliation.
- Assign a dedicated virtual account to a payer
- Automatically match incoming transfers to the correct payer
Payer details
A payer typically includes:
- Name (individual or business)
- Contact information (email, phone)
- Country and currency context
- Associated payment methods or tokens
Required fields may vary depending on the payment method and region.
Payment methods and tokens
Payers can have stored payment methods associated with them.
These are typically created through tokenization requests and can be reused for future payments.
This allows you to:
- Avoid re-collecting payment details
- Enable faster repeat payments
- Support off-session payment flows
Reuse across payment flows
Once a payer exists, it can be reused across:
- Payment requests
- Tokenization requests
- Virtual account assignments
This creates a consistent view of each payer across all collection activity.
Updating payers
Payers can be updated at any time via API or the Console.
Changes may:
- Apply to future payment requests
- Update stored contact or identity details
- Affect how payments are associated and reconciled
Payers vs payment requests
- Payers represent who is paying
- Payment requests represent what is being paid
A payment request can:
- Reference an existing payer
- Create or update a payer during the payment flow
Tracking and activity
You can track all payment activity associated with a payer.
This includes:
- Completed payments
- Failed payments
- Stored payment methods
- Incoming transfers via virtual accounts
This provides a complete view of each payer’s activity.
Best practices
- Create payers upfront when you expect repeat payments
- Associate tokenized payment methods for faster future payments
- Use virtual accounts for high-volume or transfer-based workflows
- Keep payer data accurate to improve reconciliation and reduce errors
Summary
- Payers represent the source of incoming funds
- They unify identity, payment methods, and activity across flows
- Payers can be created directly or collected during payment flows
- Reusing payers improves efficiency, accuracy, and reconciliation
Last modified on March 29, 2026
