Control your own card payments

If you take payments by credit card on The DoggyDesk, this guide explains how it works, what it costs, how money is protected for you and for dog owners, and how to set it up. Card payments are optional: cash and bank transfers keep working exactly as they do now, and they always cost you nothing.

Taking a deposit when you accept a booking means a no-show or a late cancellation does not leave you out of pocket. Card payments go through Stripe to your own Stripe account.

You become the merchant of record

When you sign up with Stripe, you become the “merchant of record” for your bookings. In plain English: you, not The DoggyDesk, are the business the dog owner is paying.

Card payments go straight into your own Stripe account, and we never hold your money. It also means that refunds, and chargebacks (when an owner disputes a payment with their bank), come out of your Stripe balance, not ours.

What it costs

Two separate fees apply to a card payment. There is no monthly fee.

• Stripe’s card-processing fee: currently 1.5% + 20p for a standard UK card. Some cards, such as premium, European and international ones, cost more. This fee goes to Stripe, not to us. See Stripe’s pricing page.
• The DoggyDesk platform fee: normally 5% of anything paid by card, which is usually just the deposit. Founding members pay 0% during the beta: see our founding member offer.

What if you change your mind?

No card is charged until you accept the booking. Until then the owner’s card only has a hold on it, and if you decline, or do not reply within 72 hours, the hold is simply released and nothing is taken.

Once you have accepted and the deposit has been taken, you can still change your mind and cancel. The owner gets all of their money back. The refund comes out of your Stripe account, and Stripe does not give back its own card-processing fee, so that small fee is yours to cover. Our platform fee, if you are paying one, is returned to you.

That is part of having your own Stripe account: refunds and Stripe’s fee are yours to manage, not ours. Cash and bank bookings never have this, because no card fees are involved.

Safeguards that protect your money

Bookings that finish within the next 87 days. You can take the deposit by card to secure the booking.

Bookings requested by a dog owner with an account that finish more than 87 days from now. The system will not take the deposit straight away. The dog owner’s card is saved securely, and we email both you and the dog owner a few days before the deposit is taken automatically, once the booking is less than 87 days from finishing.

If you add a booking yourself for a client who has no account, no card is saved. We remind you when it is time to send them a payment link.

Cash and bank bookings are not affected.

For dog owners booking with you: safeguards that protect their money

When a dog sitter or walker takes a payment on an owner’s card, the deposit is taken at that point, and the card money is paid to the sitter’s or walker’s bank the day after the booking ends.

How to set up card payments

Step 1: find Set up card payments

Open your dashboard and go to the Earnings tab. If you have not set up card payments yet, the Card money card at the top says “You’re not taking card payments yet, so this card stays empty.”

Press Set up card payments to open the card payments set-up page. You will be guided from there.

Step 2: check what it costs

The set-up page starts by showing what card payments cost, as described above.

Step 3: your details

Stripe is required by law to check who you are before it can pay you. We pass across what we already know from your profile, so you do not have to type it twice. Stripe needs a few details from you:

• your first and last name
• your home address (we do not show it anywhere)
• your date of birth (Stripe uses it to verify your identity)

Step 4: agree and continue to Stripe

Tick the box to agree to the fee terms, then press “Agree & continue to Stripe”. Your secure Stripe account is created in about ten seconds.

Stripe then takes over and asks for your bank details directly. We never see or store them. It takes a few minutes.

Not ready? Choose “Not now — continue with cash & bank only” and carry on exactly as before. You can come back whenever you like.

When you are set up

Once Stripe has everything it needs, you will see “Card payments are set up on your account”, and you can manage them from your Invoicing page. From then on you can take card deposits on your bookings.