We’re excited to share that we’re making payments in Trainerize even more powerful. But in order to do so, we’re moving away from our own built-in payment gateway that was powered by Stripe and allowing you to connect to Stripe directly for an even more powerful payments experience.

This means that you will need to sign up or connect a Stripe account directly to Trainerize as we will moving away from our built-in payment gateway on March 1st, 2022. 

You’ll still be able to create and sell your products via Trainerize, set up product automations, and all the features you’ve come to love with Trainerize Pay. With connecting a Stripe account directly,  you'll enjoy some amazing new features and benefits:

• no more transaction limits (the $1000 limit is gone)
• flexible payout schedules
• full access to Stripes dashboard and reporting
• Stripe's official fees 

Note: You will still need to continue to have the payments add-on feature to create and sell your products and accept payments. The only change is that you will have a Stripe account to use as the payment gateway vs our previous built-in payment gateway.

To enjoy these new features and benefits, all you need to do is:

1. Go to the Payments page and click Set up now from the banner or click the Setup tab. 
2. Click Sign up and connect to set up your Stripe account for Trainerize.
   • You can use the same login credentials of an existing Stripe account to connect, however a new Stripe account for Trainerize will still be created.
   • If you don't have a Stripe account and creating one on set up, you will need to verify your account. 

Important Note: Do not turn off or disable your Trainerize Pay or Payments add-on at any point in time while connecting your Stripe account, otherwise you may run into some payment issues. You still need to have your payments add-on and an active payment gateway whether that's Stripe or our old Trainerize Pay in order to sell and use payments in Trainerize. 

If you are connecting via an existing Stripe account, Trainerize Pay (our old built-in payment gateway) will be automatically be disabled once you go through the process. If you are connecting a new Stripe account, once your verification is done, Trainerize Pay (our old built-in payment gateway) will be automatically be disabled. Your Stripe add-on feature will continue to be active to create and sell products and accept payments. 

How to set up Stripe

Check out this video on how to set up Stripe for your Trainerize Pay account or keep reading below for the help article. 

1. Start Set Up in Trainerize

1. Click Setup in the Payments left navigation menu.
2. On the Setup page, under Stripe, click Sign up and Connect. **Do not click Turn Off under Stripe or under Trainerize Pay, otherwise your recurring products will be cancelled. Simply go through Stripe's onboarding and set up your Stripe account.
3. If you're just starting to use Payments for the first time, go ahead and click Sign up and Connect.
   
   

1. In the next dialog pop-up, click Set Up Payments to set up your Stripe account. 
2. If you haven't yet enabled payments yet, click Subscribe to purchase the add-on.

2. Set Up Stripe Account

• You will be prompted to set up and connect your Stripe account. Complete the set up.

Note: If you have an existing Stripe account you can enter the same email. A new Stripe account will be created and will connect to Trainerize for a seamless integrated payment experience within Trainerize. Your existing Stripe account will not be impacted nor connected to Trainerize. It will appear as a separate, new dashboard on your top left corner in Stripe. 

• On the Bank Account Information screen, provide bank account details for where to deposit your money.

• On the Customer Statement Information screen, fill in your descriptors.
  • Statement Descriptor: Choose the descriptor that will appear on your clients' credit card statements
    
  • Shortened Descriptor: Provided a shortened descriptor of your business name in the event you would like to add dynamic suffixes to provide more description of a purchase. The description will include the suffix and shortened description.

• On the Verification Summary screen, confirm your information and click Submit.
• Your Stripe account is now pending verification and once it has been approved, you will be able to accept live payments. 

Payment Processing Status Flow

There are two main statuses for Trainerize Pay: Live and Not Live.

• When Not Live, no payments will be processed and you will not be able to sell any products.
• After going live with Trainerize Pay, the Not Live status may switch to Live: Verification Required. In this case, you can process transactions, but you will not be able to receive bank payouts until you provide additional required fields.
• While in the Live: Verification Required state, if you wait more than 7 days to verify your account, your payment processing may become paused (the Live status will change to orange). To fix this, provide the additional fields required. If this does not resolve the issue, please contact our Trainerize Help Center.
• Providing additional verification information will change your account status from Live: Verification Required to Live: Pending Approval. No more action is required on your part. While waiting for final verification, you can continue to process payments and sell your products to your clients, and payments received will be paid out to your bank.

Once verified, your account will change from Live: Pending Approval to Live: All systems go! The payments setup process is finished.

Additional Verification Required

After setting up and going live with payments, there may be additional information required to verify your account depending on your country. You will be notified in Stripe in-app via a banner. Please follow instructions from Stripe to verify your account.