Payment-method icon

Recurring card payments in India

You need to process transactions via local acquiring to support the recurring flows described on this page. Reach out to your Account Manager or our Support Team to evaluate if and how you can process locally with Adyen.

You can accept recurring card payments in India for the following types of payments:

  • Subscriptions: A recurring transaction made at regular intervals for a product or a service. These payments use the Subscription recurring processing model.
  • Automatic top-ups: Contracts that occur on a non-fixed schedule using stored card details. This includes automatic top-ups when the cardholder's balance drops below a certain amount. These payments use the UnscheduledCardOnFile recurring processing model.

To process recurring card payments in India, you need to perform some extra steps:

  • You provide information about the shopper's billing plan in the payments request.
  • Based on this information, the shopper creates a mandate between them and their issuer.
  • You initiate a pre-debit notification before you charge the shopper.

How it works

The instructions on this page describe the requests and responses using Checkout API

v66
or earlier. You can use Checkout API
v67
or later, but note that there are some differences in the 3D Secure flow. For more information, see the release notes.

Set up a recurring contract and a mandate:

  1. In your payment form, a shopper selects their card and fills in their details.
  2. You send a /payments request, specifying the required details to set up a recurring contract and mandate.
  3. The shopper is redirected to the issuer and performs 3D Secure 2 authentication.
  4. The shopper is redirected back to your website.
  5. You send a /payments/details request, and include the data that you received in the /payments response.
  6. You get a response from the /payments/details request. When the result is successful, the mandate is created and you can start processing recurring Subscription or UnscheduledCardOnFile payments for your shoppers.

Use the recurring contract to make a payment:

  1. Notify the issuer that you will charge the shopper. We recommend that you do this at least 72 hours before you intend to charge the shopper.
  2. At least 24 hours before the recurring charge, the issuer sends the shopper a pre-debit notification that the recurring amount will be charged. To send a notification to the shopper, the issuer can use an SMS, or an e-mail, for example.
  3. You send a /payments request, specifying the required details to make a recurring payment.

Set up a recurring contract

To start a recurring contract for a shopper, you need to store their payment details and create a mandate with their issuer. The issuer uses this mandate to have visibility of the shopper's recurring payments. They can then let the shopper cancel (or pause/unpause) the mandate on their side.

In the examples on this page, you set up a subscription for a shopper.

Make sure that every billing plan has a unique mandate associated with it.

Make a payment

Make a POST /payments call, including:

Field Required Description
paymentMethod.type -white_check_mark- scheme
paymentMethod.encryptedCardNumber -white_check_mark- The shopper's encrypted card number.
paymentMethod.encryptedExpiryYear -white_check_mark- The shopper's encrypted card expiry year.
paymentMethod.encryptedExpiryMonth -white_check_mark- The shopper's encrypted card expiry month.
paymentMethod.encryptedSecurityCode -white_check_mark- The shopper's encrypted card CVC.
paymentMethod.holderName -white_check_mark- The name on the shopper's card.
mandate.amount -white_check_mark- The amount the shopper will be charged per recurring debit in minor units. Must be more than or equal to the transaction amount.
The recurring charge does not need to go through 3D Secure authentication if the amount is less than or equal to INR 15,000.
mandate.amountRule Possible values: max (default) and exact.
  • max - The shopper can be charged any amount between INR 1 to the amount in the amount field.
  • exact - The shopper can only be charged the amount in the amount field.
mandate.frequency -white_check_mark- The frequency at which the shopper will be charged. Possible values: monthly and adhoc.
mandate.startsAt Start date of the billing plan, in YYYY-MM-DD format. The default value is the transaction date.
mandate.endsAt -white_check_mark- End date of the billing plan, in YYYY-MM-DD format.
mandate.remarks Limited to 50 characters, no special characters.
browserInfo The shopper's browser information.
shopperEmail The shopper's email address.
shopperIP The shopper's IP address.
storePaymentMethod -white_check_mark- Set to true to store shopper's payment details.
shopperInteraction -white_check_mark- Set to Ecommerce.
recurringProcessingModel -white_check_mark- Possible values: Subscription or UnscheduledCardOnFile.
shopperReference -white_check_mark- The shopper reference associated with the billing plan (minimum length three characters).

The details in the mandate object are used to create the mandate for the shopper's billing plan.

The /payments response is:

The response contains an action object. Your next step is to Handle the redirect.

Handle the redirect

Handling the redirect is similar to handling a regular 3D Secure redirect, but with a few differences for recurring card payments in India:

  • Testing
    To test the 3D Secure 2 authentication flow, you can use a test card and static One Time Password (OTP) from the Test and go live section.
  • Mandate details returned in the response
    You will receive the mandate details as additional data in the /payments/details response.

For more detailed information about handling the redirect in the different integration types, see:
Web Drop-in
Web Component
iOS Drop-in
iOS Component
Android Drop-in
Android Component
API only

If the payment was successful, the shopper created the mandate with their issuer, and you will get a /payments/details response with:

  • resultCode: Authorised

  • additionalData.recurring.recurringDetailReference: The token for the saved payment details. You will need this to make future payments for the shopper.

    To get the recurringDetailReference synchronously in your payments response, you have to enable this feature.

  • additionalData.mandate: The details on the shopper's mandate. This contains the mandate details that you provided in your request, as well as:

    • mandate.mandateId: This field will include the identifier for the mandate created by the issuer. Currently, this is a placeholder field and we return an empty string as the value. When issuers start passing the mandateId, we will return the value in this field.
    • mandate.providerId: The ID returned by the provider.
    • mandate.status: The status of the mandate.
    • mandate.txVariant: The transaction variant.
  • pspReference: Our unique identifier for the transaction.

You will need the recurringDetailReference and shopperReference to make subsequent payments.

Present the payment result

Use the  resultCode from the /payments/details response to present the payment result to your shopper. You will also receive the outcome of the payment asynchronously in a webhook.

You can receive the following resultCode values:

resultCode Description Action to take
Authorised The payment was successful, and a mandate was created. Inform the shopper that the payment has been successful.
Cancelled The shopper cancelled the payment. Ask the shopper whether they want to continue with the order, or ask them to select a different payment method.
Error There was an error when the payment was being processed. For more information, check the refusalReason field. Inform the shopper that there was an error processing their payment.
Refused The payment was refused. For more information, check the refusalReason field. Ask the shopper to try the payment again using a different payment method.

Webhook

You'll receive a webhook with the final status of the payment.

eventCode success field Description Action to take
AUTHORISATION false The transaction failed. Cancel the order and inform the shopper that the payment failed and any amount debited will be refunded in 2-3 days.
AUTHORISATION true The shopper successfully completed the payment, and a mandate was created. Inform the shopper that the payment has been successful and proceed with the order.

You can receive the mandate details as part of your standard webhooks. To do this:

  1. In your Customer Area, go to Developers > Webhooks.
  2. Next to Standard webhook, select the edit webhook icon .
  3. Under Additional Settings, select Include Mandate Details.
  4. Select Save Configuration.

Make recurring payments

For every subsequent payment in a billing plan, for example a subscription, you need to:

  1. Initiate a pre-debit notification.
  2. Make the recurring payment.

Initiate a pre-debit notification

A pre-debit notification is an email or SMS notification sent to a shopper to inform them of their impending billing plan charge. You need to inform the issuer when the notification needs to be sent out and subsequently the issuer sends the email or SMS. When they receive the notification, shoppers can choose to cancel the mandate. Shoppers receive the pre-debit notification at least 24 hours before every recurring payment in the billing plan.

To send a pre-debit notification to your shopper, make a POST call to /notifyShopper:

  • storedPaymentMethodId: The token for your shopper's stored payment details.
  • merchantAccount: Your merchant account associated with the shopper's stored payment details.
  • shopperReference: The shopper reference associated with the billing plan.
  • amount: The amount you are going to charge the shopper. If you have configured max for the mandate.amountRule, the shopper can be charged any amount between INR 1 to the amount in the mandate.amount field. If you have configured exact, the shopper can only be charged the amount in the mandate.amount field.
  • billingDate: The date the shopper will be charged.
  • reference: The notification reference. This field is shown to the shopper if the displayedReference field is left blank or is not sent.
  • displayedReference: Optional. The reference shown to the shopper in the pre-debit notification they receive from their issuer. If this field is left blank or is not sent, the reference field will be shown instead.

The /notifyShopper response contains:

  • message: Information about the status of the pre-debit notification.
  • shopperNotificationReference: Unique reference to the pre-debit notification. Store this value to make the subsequent payment.

If the /notifyShopper request fails, you will receive a response with resultCode set to Refused.

If there was an issue with the /notifyShopper request, you will receive a response containing an errorCode and a message explaining the error. For a list of possible values, refer to Generic error codes.

Make a recurring payment

Once the shopper has received the pre-debit notification, you can carry out a recurring payment, for example for a subscription.

  1. To do so, make a POST /payments call, including:

    Field Required Description
    amount -white_check_mark- Include the currency and value of the shopper's subscription payment.
    paymentMethod.type -white_check_mark- scheme
    paymentMethod.storedPaymentMethodId -white_check_mark- The token value for the shopper's stored payment information.
    paymentMethod.shopperNotificationReference -white_check_mark- Unique reference to the pre-debit notification from the /notifyShopper response.
    shopperEmail The shopper's email address.
    shopperIP