PayPal
Recurring Payments

How to Configure
PayPal Recurring Payments

To configure PayPal subscriptions, you need to complete four steps:

• Set up the PayPal Recurring Payments addon;
• Log in to the business account on the PayPal sandbox website;
• Create a subscription plan;
• Customize a form.

To install the addon, go to JetFormBuilder > Addons and find the “PayPal Recurring Payments” addon in the All Available Addons section. Press the “Install Addon” button, and, once installed, it will appear on Your Installed Addons. Next, click “Activate Addon” to get it ready for further work.

As you can see, all PRO version addons can be installed and activated through JetFormBuilder Dashboard.

Go to the PayPal website, hit the “Log Into Dashboard” button, and log in (the email you’ll enter should be yours, not generated by the website).

Navigate to the app that you use with PayPal.

Copy the email address used for this app from the Sandbox account field.

Move to the Accounts tab, find the business account for the app, and press the “View/edit account” link.

In the Account details window, copy the System Generated Password.

Open another browser or a New Incognito window in Chrome to log into the Sandbox account using the earlier copied email address and generated password of the business account.

Open the Pay & Get Paid tab and hit the “Subscriptions” button.

Tick the “Create Plan” button.

Fill the plan fields according to your needs and push the “Turn Plan On” button.

You can skip the next step by clicking the “Do this later” button.

That’s all for the subscription plan. Now you can create a form.

Navigate to JetFormBuilder > Settings and ensure that you’ve turned on the Enable Gateways toggle.

Go to JetFormBuilder > Forms and open one of the created forms. Move to the Post Submit Actions tab and set the “Save Form Record” action.

Open the Gateways Settings tab, select the “PayPal Checkout” option, and hit the “Edit” button.

Then, you’ll see the Edit PayPal Checkout Settings pop-up.

To get the Client ID and Secret Key, return to the PayPal Developer account and click on the app. Copy the Client ID, hit the “Show” button and you’ll see the Secret key.

Enter the Client ID and Secret Key into the form fields and select the “Create a subscription” Gateway Action. Then, press the “Sync Access Token” button.

The next step is to set Subscription Plan and Quantity field. You can do this in two ways:

• Manual Input

Select the “Manual Input” option in the Subscription Plan Field and set the recently created Subscription Plan. Choose the “Manual Input” option in the Quantity field and set the quantity number of payments in the Manual input of quantity field.

• Hidden Field

You can click on the “Copy selected Plan ID” button and save the subscription ID as a Value in the Hidden Field.

Then, create the Hidden Field for the quantity.

Afterward, select such fields as the Subscription Plan field and Quantity field.

You can mix the “Manual Input” and field options in one form.

Also, you can set:

• Payment success message. This is a message that will be shown to the user after their payment is confirmed to be successful;
• Payment failed message. This message will be shown to the user if their payment does not come through.

Use macros from the list to create custom messages. You can add the following to the message:

• gateway payment status with the %gateway_status% macro;
• value of any field with the %field_name% macro (replace “field_name” with any field name from the form, e.g., %quantity_%).

Finally, click on the “Update” button and update the form.

It can be done from both sides.

After the refund, the subscription gets the inactive status (refunded) only on your website. In the PayPal dashboard, the subscription will be displayed as active. The subscription will switch to active status again when the next payment arrives.

• How to make a refund with JetFormBuilder

Navigate to JetFormBuilder > Payments, and hit the “Refund” button under the needed payment.

In the appeared Payment Details pop-up, fill the desired fields and hit the “Issue Refund” button.

• How to make a refund with PayPal

Proceed to the Sandbox PayPal website, select the needed transaction, and hit the “Refund” button. If you wish, fill out the form fields and then confirm the refund.

After you pause the subscription, you can restore it at any moment.

• How to suspend the subscription with JetFormBuilder

Proceed to JetFormBuilder > Payments, find the desired payment in the list, tick “View Subscription”, and then the “Suspend” button.

Specify the reason if you want in the appeared window, and click on the “Suspend Subscription” button. If you succeed, the subscription status will be changed.

• How to suspend the subscription with PayPal

Proceed to the PayPal website and log in with the business account (we’ve described how to do that earlier).

Press “Pause Subscription” near the needed payment, and after 1-2 minutes, the status will be changed.

You can do it only via PayPal by hitting the “Activate Subscription” button.

Be aware that if you cancel the subscription, you cannot restore it. You can do this via PayPal and JetFormBuilder by pushing the “Cancel” button.

• Why is the payment not received immediately after the subscription creation? That’s okay. You just need to wait another 1-2 minutes, and it will appear.
• Why is it worth testing/using this addon on a remote website? The addon can listen to all events occurring with the subscription and payments. In simple terms, PayPal tells our site what has changed, and the addon decides what to do with this information. All of this is possible only if the website is accessible from any device globally; in other words, it is located on remote hosting.
• Is there a possibility of a version for JetEngine in the future? No, unfortunately, there isn’t.