What text to pay is (and is not)
Text to pay means sending a customer an SMS that contains a secure link to a hosted payment page for a specific amount. The customer taps the link, enters a card or bank account, or uses Apple Pay or Google Pay, and the payment is processed on your merchant account like any other card-not-present sale. The card number is entered by the customer on a page run by the payment platform; it never passes through the text message, your phone or your staff.
Three things it is not:
- It is not a peer-to-peer app request. A Venmo or Zelle request settles between individuals and gives you no receipt, no card-on-file, no chargeback protection and no accounting trail. Text to pay runs through your merchant account with a receipt, a tokenized card and a ledger entry.
- It is not taking card numbers by text. A card number in an SMS is unencrypted, sits on two phones and a carrier's servers, and puts your business in the strictest PCI scope. The link exists so that nobody ever types a card into a message.
- It is not marketing. A payment link is a transactional message that completes a transaction the customer already agreed to. That matters for consent, as the compliance guide explains, and it is why a payment text must never carry a promotion.
What happens when you send one
From the business side it is a few clicks; from the customer side it is a tap and a form. Here is the whole sequence.
| Step | What your business does | What the customer sees |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Consent | Asks the customer, by script on the phone or by a checkbox on a form, whether they agree to receive a payment link by text, and records the answer. | A question they say yes to, or a box they tick, that says what they will receive and how to stop. |
| 2. Create the request | Enters the amount and a reference (invoice number, job, patient balance) in the payment dashboard, the messaging inbox or your own system through the API. | Nothing yet. |
| 3. Send | Clicks send. The platform texts the link from your registered business number, with your business name and an opt-out instruction. | "Northwind Plumbing: Your invoice #1042 for $1,240.00 is ready. Pay securely here: pay.northwind.example/i/1042 Reply STOP to opt out." |
| 4. Pay | Waits. The payment status in the dashboard shows sent, opened, paid. | Taps the link. A branded page opens showing the amount and reference. They enter a card or bank account, or tap Apple Pay or Google Pay, and confirm. |
| 5. Confirm | Sees the payment land, with the order or invoice marked paid, a webhook fired to any connected system, and the payment posted for QuickBooks sync. | A confirmation screen and a receipt by text or email that names your business and the amount. |
| 6. Remind (if needed) | If the link is not paid, scheduled reminders go out on the timing you set, by text or email, carrying the same link. | A reminder a day or two later with the same link, inside normal hours. |
The payment page is the important part. Because the customer enters their own card on a hosted page, the transaction is customer-initiated. When an employee keys a card read over the phone, the transaction is a mail order / telephone order (MOTO) sale. Issuers approve the first more readily than the second, and the difference is visible in the approval rate within the first month. CIT vs MIT explains why.
What text to pay costs
There are three cost components, and only one of them is new.
- Processing. The payment itself is processed at your normal card-not-present rate. Text to pay does not turn a remote sale into a card-present one. What changes is the number of declines you absorb, the MOTO surcharges some processors apply to keyed transactions, and the staff time spent taking cards by phone.
- Messaging. Carriers charge a fraction of a cent per segment for application-to-person SMS, and registering your business number under 10DLC carries a one-time brand fee and a small monthly campaign fee. For a business sending a few hundred payment texts a month, messaging cost is measured in single-digit dollars.
- Platform. The software that hosts the payment page, sends the texts, tracks consent and opt-outs, retries reminders and posts to your books. Pricing varies by provider; what matters is whether it is bundled with the rest of your invoicing and payments or billed as a separate tool.
The return is not in the fees. It is in time to payment (minutes instead of days), fewer declines than keyed MOTO transactions, fewer disputes from "I don't recognize this charge" because the customer paid it themselves and got a receipt, and the hours a week your office spends not reading card numbers back to people.
When to use text, email or phone
Most small businesses end up using all three. The question is which one leads.
| Situation | Lead with | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Balance due at completion (job done, car ready, appointment finished) | Text | The customer is paying attention right now and has their phone. Minutes to payment. |
| Detailed invoice with line items, especially B2B | Email, then text | The customer wants the PDF for their records or their accounts payable. Follow up by text if unpaid after a few days, carrying the same link. |
| Customer on the phone wanting to pay now | Text, while still on the call | Replaces reading the card aloud. The agent confirms it landed before hanging up. |
| Overdue reminder | Text | A short text with the link gets read; a third reminder email does not. Keep to two or three per invoice, inside normal hours. |
| Deposit before work starts | Text or email with the estimate | Whichever carries the estimate; the pay link rides along. |
| Customer with no mobile, or who has opted out of texts | Email or phone | STOP means stop. Move the invoice to email or take the payment on the virtual terminal. |
Where you can, send both from the same payment request so the email and the text open the same link and the invoice is marked paid whichever one the customer uses. The reminder sequence guide covers timing and wording for the follow-ups.
Setting it up: about a week
The software part takes an afternoon. The carrier registration and the consent language are what take the week, and they are not optional.
- Day 1: write the consent language. A verbal script for phone orders and a checkbox for forms and checkout, saying who will text, about what, how often, that rates may apply, and how to stop. Copy the templates in the compliance guide, or the script FloPay publishes. Add SMS terms to your website's privacy policy.
- Day 1: register the business number. Your platform submits your brand (legal name, EIN, address, website) and your campaign (use case, sample messages, opt-in description) to the carriers' 10DLC registry. Have screenshots of the consent checkbox and the script ready; reviewers reject vague opt-in descriptions. Approval takes days.
- Day 2: set up templates and reminders. The payment text, the reminder, the receipt and the HELP and STOP replies, each with your business name. Set sending hours (9 a.m. to 8 p.m. local is safe everywhere) and a cap on reminders per invoice.
- Day 3: train the people who send. Read the script every time, record the yes, never type a card number into a message, and know what to do when a customer replies with a question (answer it in the same inbox) or STOP (nothing, the system handles it).
- Day 4: set the statement descriptor. Make it the name customers know, and put it in the receipt text. This removes the most common dispute reason before it starts.
- When registration clears: test end to end with your own phone. Opt in, receive the link, pay, receive the receipt, reply STOP, confirm silence. Then go live.
Mistakes that cost small businesses
- Sending from a personal cell phone. Unregistered numbers get filtered by the carriers, and the consent and opt-out records live nowhere. Use a registered business number through the platform.
- Adding a promotion to a payment text. "Pay here, and ask about our spring special" turns a transactional message into marketing, which needs written consent you probably do not have.
- Using a public link shortener. bit.ly links are a spam signal. Use your own domain or the platform's branded short domain.
- Texting at 10 p.m. It is legal for a transactional message in most places and bad for approval rates everywhere. Set hours.
- Reminding five times. Two or three reminders, days apart, then a phone call. More than that is harassment in the customer's eyes and a complaint in the carrier's.
- Not recording the consent. In a dispute, the business proves consent; the customer does not prove its absence. Date, method, language, who captured it.
- Taking the card by text when the customer asks. It feels helpful. It is the one thing that puts card data on your phone and in your PCI scope.
What to measure after a month
Four numbers tell you whether it is working, and all four should be visible in your payment platform without a spreadsheet:
- Time to payment. Median minutes from send to paid. Texts sent at completion typically close in minutes; if yours take days, the link is going out at the wrong moment.
- Share paid without a reminder. The higher this is, the less your office is chasing.
- Approval rate versus keyed phone payments. Compare customer-initiated link payments with the MOTO transactions they replaced. The gap is the issuer telling you which one it trusts.
- Disputes per thousand payments. Customer-entered payments with a receipt and a recognizable descriptor generate fewer "not recognized" disputes. Watch it fall.
A business that sees none of these move after a month is usually sending the link too late, from an unregistered number, or without the business name in the message. All three are easy fixes.
Where FloPay fits
FloPay's text to pay sends the link from the dashboard, the two-way messaging inbox or the API, on any supported gateway, with consent recorded against the customer, STOP and HELP handled automatically, reminders on a schedule you set, and a hosted checkout that takes cards, ACH, Apple Pay and Google Pay and tokenizes them for next time. The same payment request can go by email and text, and it posts to QuickBooks when paid.
Send your first payment link this week
FloPay text to pay comes with the consent script, registered messaging, reminders and a hosted checkout on any gateway. We will send you a live link on the demo.
See Text to Pay