Deposits and balances

Each space has a deposit, either a percent of the price or a flat dollar amount. If the percent is above zero, the guest pays that percent. At signup you pick a percent from 1 to 100, and you can switch to a flat amount in settings.

The card form stays off when the account is a test host, Stripe isn't connected, or card payments aren't set up. Payouts being on is a setup step. It isn't what turns the card button on. Card payments go to your Stripe account. There's no booking fee. You pay Stripe's processing fee, which comes out of your payout. Stripe doesn't return that fee when you refund a guest.

If a guest already paid the deposit by Venmo, cash or check, you can record it. Recording it doesn't charge a card.

A booking is confirmed once the deposit and anything you required are in. If you didn't ask for a file, the deposit is enough. While a guest pays the deposit by card, checkout holds the time for 30 minutes. That's separate from how long an unanswered request holds.

If the price is more than the deposit, the rest is the balance. It's due a set number of days before the visit. The account setting starts at 14 days and applies to every space, unless a space has its own number. Leave a space's number blank to use the account setting.

Once the deposit is recorded, you can record the balance by Venmo, cash, check or other, for whatever amount is still open. If card payments are connected, you can also send a Stripe invoice for the balance from the booking. Guests can pay it by card or bank transfer, and there's no booking fee.

The email that reminds guests about an open balance is covered in Reminder timing.