How can I save customer credit card details for rental renewals?

[mim768]

I own a medical supply company and rent medical equipment to the public by the month. I'm looking for a way to allow my customers to book their rental on our website, and then save their credit card on file for rental renewals at the same time.

We are currently using multiple methods for savings cards on file that are taking more time than I believe should be necessary. Shopify itself accepted my credit card on file to bill my monthly fee, and yet I can't seem to find an acceptable solution for my customers.

Sending an invoice for payment is not an option as they are in possession of my expensive equipment.

I am working with customers who are caring for their sick family members, and need an easy solution to rent equipment for them.  I've looked at "subscription plans", and these don't seem to fit our needs.

I'm very aware of PCI compliance when working with credit cards on file, and am looking for a solution that fits that compliance.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

[StephensWorld]

Hey Mim,

This was recently discussed in this thread: https://community.shopify.com/c/payments-shipping-and/card-on-file-for-manual-order/m-p/1783793

TLDR: your only real option for this would be via a subscription app, as Shopify doesn't support keeping customers' credit cards on file. Otherwise, you'd be looking at the 'draft orders' functionality which you previously mentioned. 

To my knowledge, there aren't any other workarounds for this. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news. 

Cheers,

Stephen

[mim768]

Thanks, yes I actually jumped in on that conversation. If there is a subscription app that allows you to choose the start date and renewal date, that would work, but I can’t find one. Otherwise, the subscription is renewing before the due date.

[StephensWorld]

To my knowledge, all of the subscription apps work on a pre-set timeframe.

ex. daily, weekly, bi-weekly, monthly, etc.

Like you - as the store owner - would need to set up the duration/time-frame options, and then your customers would have to choose which ones they wanted. 

So you could set something up to recur every 10 days, for a product that's meant to be used for a week ... so that if they don't return it within the 10 days, then they get charged again ... but then you'd have that grey zone, where if a customer is supposed to return it within 7 days, but decides to keep it for 9, then they wouldn't be charged anything extra. 

I don't believe any of the subscription apps will allow you to set custom timelines/durations on a per-customer basis, and then charge them manually (whenever you, as the store owner, wants). 

The recurring charge has to be agreed to by the customer, when they're placing their original order (or else store owners could just charge multiple times whenever they want, and then there would be a bunch of chargeback situations, and disputes). 

The easiest way (and what I would do if it were my store) is just use the 'draft orders' functionality, and invoice them whenever you need to. Yes, the customer could choose to ignore your invoice, but that's still probably your best bet. Shopify will also remember most of their details (address, name, email, etc.) from the first order, if they're using ShopPay - or if your store has customer accounts enabled.