Sunbit payments

Sunbit is a buy now, pay later payment method available in the US that gives your customers the flexibility to choose the number of monthly installments they want to use for payment. When customers select Sunbit as their payment method, Stripe redirects them to Sunbit’s website, where they can choose between 3, 6, 12, or 18-month flexible payment plans to complete their purchase. You get paid up front. Sunbit handles the customer’s payments and collections.

Eligibility and availability

Account eligibility

Offboarding and appeals

If your account is rejected or offboarded from Sunbit, you can appeal by contacting Stripe support. Stripe coordinates with Sunbit on your behalf to review the decision.

Additional requirements

You acknowledge that:

• Sunbit (and/or its partner bank) decides if customers can use Sunbit for purchases and has the sole right to receive payment from Sunbit customers. Stripe acquires those purchases for you and settles the funds to you.
• Customers must complete their own applications and review all terms related to your goods and services and the use of Sunbit.
• You can’t impose fees or higher prices for Sunbit purchases (that is, no surcharging).
• The amount financed including any down payment entered on the customer application for Sunbit purchases must be equal to or less than the price of goods/services delivered/rendered to the customer.

Payment support

Capabilities

Refunds

You have up to 180 days from the original payment to submit a refund using the Dashboard or Refunds API. This is the maximum the payment method allows-your return policy determines what you offer customers.

Refunds for Sunbit payments are asynchronous and take up to 5 minutes to complete. Sunbit refunds can’t be canceled.

Refund process

Sunbit refunds are never processed as reversals. When you issue a refund, Sunbit cancels any remaining scheduled payments and returns any amounts the customer has already paid. The customer sees the update reflected in their Sunbit account.

Tracking refunds

You can view refund status in the Dashboard. Open the payment and click View Details on the refund entry, or retrieve the Refund object and check its status field. Stripe also notifies you of the final refund status using the refund.updated or refund.failed webhook event. When a refund succeeds, the status of the Refund object transitions to succeeded. If a refund fails, the status transitions to failed, Stripe returns the amount to your Stripe balance, and you must arrange an alternative way to provide your customer with a refund.

Disputes

There’s no set time limit for customers to file Sunbit disputes.

Sunbit payments can only be disputed once.

Dispute process

1. Dispute opened: Sunbit opens a dispute. Stripe immediately withholds the disputed amount from your balance. You have 12 calendar days to submit evidence.
2. Decision: Sunbit reviews your evidence and issues a final decision within 35 calendar days of dispute creation.

Dispute notifications

When a Sunbit dispute is opened, Stripe notifies you through:

• Email
• The Stripe Dashboard
• A charge.dispute.created webhook event

The dispute reason is available in the Dashboard and in the reason field of the Dispute object. The evidence submission deadline is available in the Dashboard and in the evidence_due_by field of the Dispute object.

Responding to disputes

You have 12 calendar days from dispute creation to submit evidence.

We request that you upload compelling evidence proving that you fulfilled the purchase order using the Stripe Dashboard. This evidence can include the:

• Tracking ID
• Shipping date
• Record of purchase for intangible goods, such as IP address or email receipt
• Record of purchase for services or physical goods, such as phone number or proof of receipt
• Record of refund (for purchases you’ve already refunded)

You can submit evidence and manage Sunbit disputes in the Dashboard or programmatically using the Disputes API. In the Dashboard, go to the Needs Response tab, click the disputed payment, then click Counter dispute to submit your evidence, or Accept dispute to accept the loss. To submit evidence through the API, upload supporting files using the Files API and include the returned file IDs when you update the Dispute Evidence object.

Dispute outcomes

If Sunbit resolves the dispute in your favor, Stripe returns the disputed amount to your Stripe balance.

If they rule in favor of the customer, the balance charge becomes permanent.

Fees and appeals

Sunbit does not charge dispute fees. If Sunbit resolves the dispute in your favor, Stripe returns the full disputed amount to your Stripe balance with no fees deducted.

Sunbit dispute decisions are final. You cannot appeal a dispute after Sunbit issues its decision.

Fraud and liability

Customers must authenticate Sunbit payments by logging into their Sunbit account. This requirement helps reduce the risk of fraud or unrecognized payments. While Sunbit covers losses incurred from customer fraud, Stripe might contact you on behalf of Sunbit and request to stop or pause shipment before any losses are incurred. Comply promptly with these requests.

Stripe product support

Customer experience

Transaction identifiers

After a customer completes a Sunbit payment, the transactions that appear on the customer’s bank statement shows Sunbit along with a merchant identifier that Sunbit derives from your registered business information or the statement descriptor suffix you configured.

Set a custom statement descriptor on the PaymentIntent before confirming the payment. If you don’t set one, the descriptor defaults to the account level statement descriptor. For connect scenarios, learn more about how statement descriptors are set with Connect.

After the payment completes, expand latest_charge on the PaymentIntent to retrieve the Sunbit transaction ID from latest_charge.payment_method_details.sunbit.transaction_id. Share it with customers to help them locate the payment in their Sunbit account or when contacting Sunbit support.

Enable Sunbit

If you use our front-end products, you can enable Sunbit directly from your payment method settings. Stripe then automatically determines the most relevant payment methods to display to your customers.

If your integration requires manually listing payment methods, learn how to manually configure Sunbit as a payment.