Recurring payments with stored card details

Last updated: October 22, 2025

If a customer is setting up a series of repeat payments, you can store their card details during the initial transaction. For example, if they're paying for a product in installments or setting up a recurring payment for a subscription service.

You can then use the stored details to request payment for subsequent card-not-present (CNP) transactions in the payment series. These types of transactions are referred to as merchant-initiated transactions (MITs).

Note

MIT installments are not supported for American Express payments.

Call the Request a payment or payout endpoint for the initial cardholder-initiated transaction (CIT), in which the customer sets up the agreement.

In the request body, provide the following:

payment_type – Set to Installment or Recurring.
merchant_initiated – Set to false.

Because installments and recurring payments require you to store the cardholder’s details, you do not need to set the source.store_for_future_use boolean to true.

In regions that require Strong Customer Authentication (SCA), you must enable 3D Secure (3DS) authentication for the transaction by setting 3ds.enabled to true.

Note

If you do not provide the required information, your request has a higher risk of being declined with a 20154 response code. If this happens, Checkout.com automatically upgrades the payment to 3DS and retries the transaction.

You must also set 3ds.challenge_indicator to challenge_requested_mandate to prevent subsequent CNP transactions from being declined.

For more information, see SCA compliance guide.

SAQ D and SAQ A are the highest and lowest forms of PCI compliance, respectively.

For more information, see PCI compliance.

post

https://api.checkout.com/payments


1{
2  "source": {
3    "type": "card",
4    "number": 4242424242424242,
5    "expiry_month": 10,
6    "expiry_year": 2026
7  },
8  "amount": 5000,
9  "currency": "USD",
10  "payment_type": "Recurring",
11  "merchant_initiated": false,
12  "3ds": {
13    "enabled": true,
14    "challenge_indicator": "challenge_requested_mandate"
15  }
16}


1{
2  "source": {
3    "type": "token",
4    "token": "tok_tokenguid"
5  },
6  "amount": 5000,
7  "currency": "USD",
8  "payment_type": "Recurring",
9  "merchant_initiated": false,
10  "3ds": {
11    "enabled": true,
12    "challenge_indicator": "challenge_requested_mandate"
13  }
14}


1{
2  "id": "pay_4hlqceyyib5ezpxtpdpwfhwtda",
3  "status": "Pending",
4  "reference": "ORD-5023-4E89",
5  "3ds": {
6    "downgraded": false,
7    "enrolled": "Y"
8  },
9  "_links": {
10    "self": {
11      "href": "https://api.sandbox.checkout.com/payments/pay_fbfrj7f3bwou5bdgmzsryd223i"
12    },
13    "actions": {
14      "href": "https://api.sandbox.checkout.com/payments/pay_fbfrj7f3bwou5bdgmzsryd223i/actions"
15    },
16    "redirect": {
17      "href": "https://api.sandbox.checkout.com/redirect/act_y3oqhf46pyzuxjbcn2giaqnb44"
18    }
19  }
20}

Once the customer has set up a payment agreement, you can initiate subsequent CNP transactions in the payment series. For example, if the customer pays using auto-renewal at the end of a subscription period.

Call the Request a payment or payout endpoint

In the request body, provide the following:

payment_type – Set to Installment or Recurring.
merchant_initiated – Set to true.

You must also provide one of the following values in the previous_payment_id field:

The payment ID of the initial CIT.
The payment ID of a previous MIT in the payment series.
The card scheme's transaction ID, if previous transactions in the payment series were processed by another payment service provider (PSP). The value you provide must meet the scheme's transaction ID requirements.

If you do not provide a previous_payment_id:

Checkout.com automatically attempts to retrieve the payment ID from the initial CIT in the payment series.
If the fallback mechanism fails to find a payment ID, we attempt to downgrade the MIT to a CIT and apply relevant exceptions.

Note

Do not use the fallback mechanism as your primary method of managing transaction IDs.

Card scheme	Requirements
Visa	The ID length must be 15 characters. The ID must start with number three, four, or five.
Mastercard	The ID length must be 13 characters. The first three characters must be a valid product code. The last four characters must be in `MMDD` format. For example, `0227`.
Diners Club	The ID length must be 15 characters. TheID must start with number one, seven, or eight.
Cartes Bancaires	The ID length must be 16 characters. The ID must be in hexadecimal format and start with number one.

Information

If the card scheme cannot find the original transaction ID, you may see an increase in soft declines.

Merchant-initiated transactions fall out of scope of SCA and qualify for exemption under the merchant-initiated exclusion, which means 3DS authentication is not required.

You can either set 3ds.enabled to false, or omit it from the request.

post

https://api.checkout.com/payments


1{
2  "source": {
3    "type": "card",
4    "number": 4242424242424242,
5    "expiry_month": 10,
6    "expiry_year": 2026,
7    "stored": true
8  },
9  "amount": 5000,
10  "currency": "USD",
11  "payment_type": "Recurring",
12  "merchant_initiated": true,
13  "previous_payment_id": "pay_paymentid"
14}


1{
2  "source": {
3    "type": "id",
4    "id": "src_instrumentguid"
5  },
6  "amount": 5000,
7  "currency": "USD",
8  "payment_type": "Recurring",
9  "merchant_initiated": true,
10  "previous_payment_id": "pay_paymentid"
11}


1{
2  "id": "pay_4prafl3phiyejkfrjtgzlh4kye",
3  "action_id": "act_ep5277oczf7u7lg6hrsscbt6xy",
4  "amount": 100,
5  "currency": "USD",
6  "approved": true,
7  "status": "Authorized",
8  "auth_code": "482LT5",
9  "response_code": "10000",
10  "response_summary": "Approved",
11  "balances": {
12    "total_authorized": 100,
13    "total_voided": 0,
14    "available_to_void": 100,
15    "total_captured": 0,
16    "available_to_capture": 100,
17    "total_refunded": 0,
18    "available_to_refund": 0
19  },
20  "risk": {
21    "flagged": false
22  },
23  "source": {
24    "id": "src_y4pwpefkykre7ijbeyxjsxdkf4",
25    "type": "card",
26    "expiry_month": 12,
27    "expiry_year": 2025,
28    "scheme": "Visa",
29    "last4": "4242",
30    "fingerprint": "005D09BED0F110E7B3B13407DF0167F6E68C2FEFAB094D49DA4B4BFAE459C569",
31    "bin": "424242",
32    "card_type": "CREDIT",
33    "card_category": "CONSUMER",
34    "issuer": "Test Bank",
35    "issuer_country": "GB",
36    "product_id": "F",
37    "product_type": "Visa Classic",
38    "payment_account_reference": ""
39  },
40  "processed_on": "2023-01-25T16:42:20.8748358Z",
41  "reference": "ORD-5023-4E89",
42  "scheme_id": "481108533665280",
43  "processing": {
44    "acquirer_transaction_id": "931228481108533665280",
45    "retrieval_reference_number": "302516931228"
46  },
47  "expires_on": "2023-02-01T16:42:20.8106477Z",
48  "_links": {
49    "self": {
50      "href": "https://api.sandbox.checkout.com/payments/pay_fbfrj7f3bwou5bdgmzsryd223i"
51    },
52    "actions": {
53      "href": "https://api.sandbox.checkout.com/payments/pay_fbfrj7f3bwou5bdgmzsryd223i/actions"
54    },
55    "redirect": {
56      "href": "https://api.sandbox.checkout.com/redirect/act_y3oqhf46pyzuxjbcn2giaqnb44"
57    }
58  }
59}

Information

You may be able to automatically retry failed payments if you configure scheduled retries, or enable automatic downtime retries.

Recurring payments with stored card details

Note

Store card details during the initial transaction

SCA requirements

Note

PCI compliance requirements

Request examples

Response example

Request a payment in a subsequent MIT

Note

Scheme transaction ID requirements

Information

SCA requirements

Request examples

Response example

Information