How It Works

A Visual Tour of PayPal Subscriptions

In this tour, a customer named Bob, who is new to PayPal, will be purchasing a subscription to Alice’s Writers Weekly from Alice’s website.

What Your Customer Sees

1.	Bob goes to Alice’s website and clicks the Subscribe button.

2.	Bob is taken to a PayPal Payment Details page, which displays the details of the payment he is about to make, as well as the details of the subscription.

3.	Bob is prompted to log in to his PayPal account; however, he is not yet a PayPal member, so he follows the sign-up instructions.

4.	So that he can make future payments for this subscription, Bob is prompted to add his credit card, email address, and password, creating his new PayPal account.

5.	Bob is taken to a confirmation page that displays the details of his subscription as well as information about how his automatic payments will be funded. He clicks the Pay button to complete payment.

6.	Bob is taken to a confirmation page where he sees the details of his successful transaction. He is also given Alice’s customer service email address and an ID for his subscription. He clicks the Continue button and is returned to a page Alice specified when she created the Subscriptions button.

Note:

If Auto Return for Website Payments is selected, buyers will beredirected back to the merchant’s site immediately after clicking the Pay button on the Payment Confirmation page. To learn more about Auto Return, please refer to the PayPal User Manual and Integration Guide, which is available on the PayPal website.

7.	Bob receives an email receipt for the transaction, confirming his subscription and including a copy of the subscription’s terms and payment details.

What You See

1.	Alice receives an email notification of Bob’s subscription.

2.	Alice logs into her PayPal account to check the subscription, and sends Bob information about accessing the subscription.

3.	After Bob’s trial period is over, Alice receives an email notification of his automatic subscription payment.

4.	Alice logs into her PayPal account to check the payment Bob has sent.

5.	Alice clicks the Completed link to see the details of the payment. The link in the upper right corner gives Alice the subscription number.

6.	The funds from Bob’s subscription payment are now reflected in Alice’s PayPal account balance.

Automating the Process

You can automate the handling of your Subscriptions notifications, and even let PayPal help you manage your passwords. To learn more, see “Password Management” and the PayPal Merchant User Manual and Integration Guide.