Rentalbuddy or Stripe — where do I go for what?

Almost every payment question comes down to one thing: two systems are involved, and it is not obvious which one owns what. This page gives you the split, so you always know where to click.

The short version:

• Rentalbuddy decides what the customer is charged, how the payment step is presented, and when to send money back.
• Stripe is the payment account. It holds the money, decides which payment methods are offered, and pays out to your bank.

You reach Stripe from your own Stripe login at stripe.com, not from Rentalbuddy.

Where to go for what

Question	Rentalbuddy	Stripe
Connect / disconnect the payment account	Start the connection here	Approve and complete the onboarding
Which payment methods customers see (card, Apple Pay, Klarna, TWINT…)	—	Yes — enabled in your Stripe account
How the payment step is presented (in the booking window or on a separate page)	Yes — Payment option	—
Turn online payment off completely	Yes — Disable Stripe Payments	—
Currency	Yes — Currency	—
Prices, add-ons, promo codes	Yes	—
VAT / tax rates	Yes — tax settings (synced to Stripe)	You can also create rates here, then sync them in
Refunds	Yes — on the booking	Also possible here
Payouts, payout frequency, bank account	—	Yes
Card fees, disputes, chargebacks	—	Yes
Booking confirmation email	Yes — email settings	—
Card payment receipt	—	Yes
Booking lists and exports	Yes — Export	Payment-level reports

Where the settings live in Rentalbuddy

Everything below is under Settings in the left menu.

Connecting Stripe

Open Settings, then the Payments tab. Under Online payments you will see either Connected or Not connected, and a button to connect. The same connection also appears under the Integrations tab, described there as "Connect Stripe to accept card payments and receive payouts for your rentals."

Until this is connected, customers cannot pay by card.

The payment step: in the booking window or on a separate page

Still on the Payments tab, under Checkout settings, there is a setting called Payment option with exactly two choices:

1. In plugin (if you plan to use card, apple pay,google pay) — the customer pays inside your booking window without leaving your website.
2. Redirect (If you plan to use redirect payment options such as: Klarna or Twint) — the customer is sent to a separate Rentalbuddy payment page to complete the payment.

This matters more than it looks. Some payment methods work by sending the customer away to another app or bank page and then back again. If you have enabled such a method in Stripe and it does not show up at checkout, this setting is the first thing to check — switch it to Redirect.

There is also a Disable Stripe Payments switch on the same screen. Its own description in the admin reads: "When Stripe payments are disabled, customers can complete bookings without paying online at checkout (typically unpaid or pay on site)."

Currency is on the same screen, but it can only be changed while the account has no active or future bookings on any location. If the selection is locked, bookings already exist.

VAT and tax rates

Open Settings, then the tax settings tab. Tax rates are created and listed here, with a country, a percentage, and whether they are Inclusive or Exclusive. If you have none yet, Generate default taxes creates the standard rates for your country and syncs them to your Stripe account.

Tax rates travel in both directions:

• Rates you create in Rentalbuddy are pushed to Stripe.
• Rates you create in the Stripe Dashboard are pulled in with Sync from Stripe. The screen says so itself: "To create more taxes, create them in the Stripe Dashboard and then sync from Stripe."

You then pick which rate applies to each product with Select VAT on the product. That rate is what gets attached to the payment at checkout, so a product with no VAT selected is charged without a tax rate.

You must be connected to Stripe before you can create or manage tax rates.

Payment methods (this one is Stripe's)

Rentalbuddy does not have a list of payment methods to tick. When a customer reaches the payment step, Rentalbuddy hands the order to Stripe without naming which methods are allowed — so what the customer sees is decided by the payment method settings in your own Stripe account.

That means:

1. Enable the method in Stripe.
2. If the method works by sending the customer to another page or app (for example Klarna or TWINT), set Payment option to Redirect in Rentalbuddy.
3. Test with a real booking on your own site.

If a method is enabled in Stripe and still does not appear, the usual causes are on Stripe's side — the method may not be available for your country, your currency, or the amount being charged. Stripe's own payment method settings page will tell you.

Payouts, fees and disputes

None of these exist in Rentalbuddy. When money reaches your bank account, how often, what the card fee was, and anything to do with a disputed payment is entirely in your Stripe dashboard. For bookkeeping, most operators use the Stripe payout reports for the money side and the Rentalbuddy Export for the booking side.

Refunds

Refunds are done in Rentalbuddy now — open the booking, find the payment in the Payment list and use the refund action there. You no longer have to go to Stripe for this. See Refund or cancel a booking for the exact steps and limits.

Refunding in the Stripe dashboard instead still works, but with two catches: the refund only shows up in Rentalbuddy after the booking's payment data is reloaded, and Rentalbuddy does not recalculate the booking's payment status. Refunding from the booking keeps both systems in step, so use that.

Emails and receipts

The booking confirmation the customer gets is a Rentalbuddy email. You edit its text, sender and timing under Settings → email settings.

A card payment receipt is a different document and Rentalbuddy does not produce one. If your customers receive a card receipt, it comes from Stripe — receipt emails are configured in your Stripe account settings.

Operators often use the two words interchangeably, but they are different documents: the confirmation is your booking document, the receipt is Stripe's proof of the card charge.

How to trace one booking to its payment

Every booking carries the identifiers you need.

1. Open the booking under Bookings.
2. Scroll to Payment. Each payment line shows Amount, Payment method, a status, a Payment ID and the time it was created.
3. For a card payment, Payment method shows Stripe and Payment ID is the identifier of that payment in Stripe. Copy it and search for it in your Stripe dashboard.
4. Refunds appear as their own lines underneath, with a negative amount and the method Stripe (return).

Going the other way — from Stripe to the booking — works too: the booking number is saved as the payment's description in Stripe, so searching Stripe for a booking number finds its payment.

Quick answers

"I turned on a payment method in Stripe but customers don't see it." Check Payment option in Settings → Payments. Methods that redirect the customer need Redirect. If that is already set, the restriction is in Stripe (country, currency or amount).

"Where do I change how often I get paid?" In Stripe. There is no such setting in Rentalbuddy.

"A customer's payment failed — why?" Rentalbuddy only records the outcome; the reason for a declined card is in Stripe. Look up the payment there using the Payment ID from the booking.

"Do I need to create my promo codes in Stripe too?" No. You create them under Promo codes in Rentalbuddy. Rentalbuddy creates the matching code in your Stripe account for you, which is why you may also see it listed there — you do not need to touch it.

"Which VAT ends up on the booking?" The rate you selected on each product, taken from your tax settings.