Charge a payment

Transfer money form the customer to the merchant.

Overview

The charge resource is used for activating the flow of transferring the money from the customer to you (merchant). When the customer initiates a payment, based on your configuration, a direct charge request or authorization request is created. You can either charge directly or authorize the payment and then charge it later.

Check Payment methods page to see what payment methods support direct charge and charge after authorization.

For secured payment methods like invoice secured, paylater invoice, and installment secured, the charge is the confirmation of the shipment by you. It ensures the payout to you. Without the shipment or charge, your transaction will not be paid out. Read more in Confirm shipment page.

Charge directly

Direct charge will debit customer’s account without any prior authorization.

To trigger a direct charge, call the charge function of the Unzer object with an amount, currency, order ID, and a reference to a payment method. Alternatively, you can use the charge function of an existing payment type object

// basic charge example
Unzer unzer  = new Unzer("s-priv-xxxxxxxxxx");
Charge charge = unzer.charge(BigDecimal.valueOf(12.99), Currency.getInstance("EUR"), "s-crd-9wmri5mdlqps", "https://your.return.url");

// basic charge example
Unzer unzer = new Unzer("s-priv-xxxxxxxxxx");
Card card = (Card) unzer.fetchPaymentType("s-crd-9wmri5mdlqps");
Charge charge = card.charge(BigDecimal.valueOf(12.99), Currency.getInstance("EUR"), "https://your.return.url");

Some payment types require a customer resource, which can be passed as additional parameter to the transaction.
Refer to the Manage Customer section to learn more about adding a customer reference.

Arguments to Unzer.charge

For a full list of the charges request parameter, please refer to API reference.

Arguments to charge of payment type

Charge after Authorization

You can charge a payment after authorization. You can have several charges up to the authorized amount. The SDK provides multiple ways to perform this task.

Option 1: Charge full amount

// charge authorized amount by payment ID
Unzer unzer = new Unzer('s-priv-xxxxxxxxxx');
Charge charge = unzer.chargeAuthorization('s-pay-1');

// charge authorized amount by authorization object
Unzer unzer = new Unzer('s-priv-xxxxxxxxxx');
Authorization authorization = unzer.fetchAuthorization('s-pay-1');
Charge charge = authorization.charge();

// charge authorized amount by payment object
Unzer unzer = new Unzer('s-priv-xxxxxxxxxx');
Payment payment = unzer.fetchPayment('s-pay-1');
Charge charge = payment.charge();

Option 2: Charge partial amount

If you want, you can also partially charge a payment. This is useful if you shipped some goods to the customer and only want to invoice the shipped goods. If you are charging partially, and charge more than the total charge amount, an error is displayed.

// part charge authorization by payment ID
Unzer unzer = new Unzer('s-priv-xxxxxxxxxx');
Charge charge1 = unzer.chargeAuthorization('s-pay-1', BigDecimal.valueOf(50.0));
Charge charge2 = unzer.chargeAuthorization('s-pay-1', BigDecimal.valueOf(50.0));

// part charge authorization by authorization object
Unzer unzer = new Unzer('s-priv-xxxxxxxxxx');
Authorization authorization = unzer.fetchAuthorization('s-pay-1');
Charge charge1 = authorization.charge(BigDecimal.valueOf(50.0));
Charge charge2 = authorization.charge(BigDecimal.valueOf(50.0));

// part charge authorization by payment object
Unzer unzer = new Unzer('s-priv-xxxxxxxxxx');
Payment payment = unzer.fetchPayment('s-pay-1');
Charge charge1 = payment.charge(BigDecimal.valueOf(50.0));
Charge charge2 = payment.charge(BigDecimal.valueOf(50.0));

Arguments to Unzer.chargeAuthorization

Arguments to Authorization.charge

Arguments to Payment.charge

Transaction Results

The transaction response is stored in the transaction object. It contains a paymentId (for example, s-pay-1) the transactionId, and other properties of the response. The transaction object provides getter functions to access those properties, for example charge.getPaymentId()

The status indicates the result of the transaction. Possible values SUCCESS, PENDING or ERROR

If a transaction fails, the Unzer API returns an error resource instead of a transaction. In the SDK, this is handled as an UnzerPaymentException. Make sure to catch that case properly.

try {
    Unzer unzer  = new Unzer("s-priv-xxxxxxxxxx");
    Charge charge = unzer.charge(BigDecimal.valueOf(12.99), Currency.getInstance("EUR"), "s-crd-9wmri5mdlqps", "https://your.return.url");

    if (charge.Status.equals(Charge.Status.SUCCESS)) {
        this.redirectToSuccess();
    }
    // Transaction has to be pending at this point.
    this.redirectToPending();
} catch (HttpCommunicationException | PaymentException e) {
    // Transaction failed. API returned error resource.
    List<PaymentError> paymentErrorList = e.getPaymentErrorList();
    //Handle API Errors
    
    this.redirectToFailure(); // redirect to the failure page of your shop
} catch (Exception e) {
    merchantMessage = e.getMessage();
}

See also

• Additional transaction data
• Cancel a charge (refund)
• Authorize a payment
• Authentication reference
• Test data