Selling plans define what customers can buy through your PayWhirl widgets. A plan controls the price, billing frequency, optional trial or installment rules, and any additional settings that should apply when a customer checks out.
Selling plans can be used for ongoing subscriptions, fixed-payment plans, pre-orders, rentals, memberships, layaway-style offers, digital products, and other recurring or scheduled billing setups.
Using PayWhirl with BigCommerce?
This article explains how to create selling plans for PayWhirl widgets. These widget-based plans are separate from BigCommerce native checkout selling plans.
If you are using the PayWhirl BigCommerce integration with native checkout, use How to create selling plans and plan groups for BigCommerce's native checkout instead.
Use this guide to create a PayWhirl Multi-Platform selling plan that can be added to a widget. This article does not apply to BigCommerce native checkout selling plans, Shopify selling plan groups, or other platform-specific checkout settings.
Prerequisites
Before creating a selling plan, make sure you have:
A PayWhirl Multi-Platform account
At least one payment method or test gateway available for checkout testing
The price, currency, and billing frequency you want to offer
Any optional details you want to include, such as an SKU, setup charge, customer questions, promo codes, or digital download file
If you are still testing your setup, you can use PayWhirl's Test Gateway before charging a live payment method. See How to run test charges using PayWhirl's Test Gateway for more details.
Create a selling plan
In PayWhirl, open Selling Plans from the main navigation.
On the Plans page, select Create.
On the Create Selling Plan page, complete the Plan Rules section.
Enter a Name for the plan. Use a name your team can recognize later, such as Monthly Membership, Quarterly Subscription, or 6-Month Payment Plan.
Set the Charge amount. Choose the currency selector and enter the amount customers should be billed each cycle.
Set Charge every. Use the billing-frequency selector to choose how often the customer should be charged, such as every month, every week, or another supported interval.
Review the lower plan settings and adjust only the options that apply to this plan.
Save the selling plan.
After the plan is saved, you can add it to a PayWhirl widget so customers can select it during checkout. If you need help adding the plan to a widget, see PayWhirl widgets & embed codes.
Optional plan settings
The settings below are available while creating or editing a selling plan. The options you use depend on the kind of plan you are selling.
Shipping, tax, and internal details
Charge Shipping: Choose whether this plan should include shipping charges when applicable.
Charge Sales Tax: Choose whether this plan should include sales tax when applicable.
SKU: Add an internal SKU if you use SKUs for reporting, fulfillment, or internal organization.
Enable Plan in Customer Portal: Choose whether customers should be able to access this plan in the customer portal.
Billing timing
Billing Cycle Start Day: Set a specific day of the month for the billing cycle to start.
Billing Cycle Start Time: Set the time of day for the billing cycle to start.
Free Trial: Delay the first paid charge by the number of trial days you enter.
Installments: Set whether the plan should continue with no limit or stop after a specific number of charges.
Use installments when the plan should end automatically after a set number of payments. For example, you might use installments for a payment plan, prepaid package, limited-term membership, layaway-style offer, or other fixed-length subscription.
If you need a more advanced schedule, you may be able to chain one fixed-installment plan into another plan. This can be useful when a customer should move from one billing arrangement to another after a certain number of payments.
Important timing note
Free trials, billing-cycle start days, billing-cycle start times, and installment settings can affect when the first charge happens, when orders are created, and when access is granted through connected services.
Before launching the plan, test the checkout and first billing cycle to confirm the timing works as expected. This is especially important if the plan includes:
A free trial
A setup charge
Digital access or downloadable files
Fulfillment rules based on successful payment
A connected integration that depends on the first order or subscription payment
Cancellation and setup charges
Customer Cancellation Behavior: Choose how customer cancellation should be handled for this plan.
Setup Charge: Add a one-time fee to the plan's first invoice or payment, if your offer requires one.
Setup charges are commonly used for onboarding fees, starter kits, enrollment fees, or other one-time costs that should be billed when the customer first starts the plan.
If the plan also has a free trial, test the first invoice carefully. Depending on the plan setup, the free trial may affect when the setup charge is collected.
Tags
Tags organize selling plans internally. Tags can help your team find or group plans later.
Customer Profile Questions
Customer Profile Questions collect extra information from customers during checkout. The available options are:
Disabled
Ask on first checkout
Ask on every checkout
Only ask for information you need to fulfill or manage the plan. If you need to create or manage these questions, see How to create custom profile questions for more details.
Promo Codes
Promo Codes make discounts available for this selling plan. Promo-code behavior can vary depending on how the code is configured, so review your discount settings carefully before sharing the widget with customers.
For more detailed discount setup, see How to set up promo codes, coupons, or discounts.
Digital Download
Digital Download attaches a downloadable file to the plan. Upload the file with Upload File, then choose whether to show it on the customer downloads page with Show in Customer Downloads Page set to Yes or No.
Digital downloads are often used for memberships, courses, files, digital products, or access instructions connected to a subscription plan.
PayWhirl's digital-download flow can send the file link with the new subscription email after a successful purchase, so test the checkout and email before relying on the download flow.
For more setup details, see How to attach a digital download to a subscription plan.
Email Settings
Use Email Settings if the plan needs custom email behavior, such as a plan-specific template or disabled emails for this plan.
For broader email-template, sender validation, and notification testing steps, see Email settings & testing overview.
Integration-specific settings
Depending on your account and connected services, additional integration-specific options may appear after the plan is saved.
Those settings can vary by integration and are handled in the relevant integration or order-settings article. This guide focuses on creating the core PayWhirl selling plan to add to a widget.
What happens next
After you save a selling plan, add it to a PayWhirl widget so customers can select it during checkout.
Before sharing the widget with customers, run a test checkout. Testing helps confirm that the plan name, price, billing frequency, trial behavior, installment rules, setup charge, digital download, email behavior, and any customer-facing settings appear as expected.
Once the selling plan has been tested, you can publish or share the widget with customers.
Wrapping up
Selling plans are the foundation for what customers can purchase through PayWhirl widgets. Taking a few extra minutes to review the billing rules, optional settings, and customer-facing checkout experience can help prevent confusion after launch.
If anything does not look right during testing, review the plan settings, confirm the widget is using the correct plan, and check any connected integration settings that may apply.
Thanks for using PayWhirl!
— The PayWhirl Team