An introduction to Openprovider’s prepaid system

One of the key aspects of our service model at Openprovider is our prepaid payment system. In this post, we explain why we use a prepaid system, how our system works, and how you can top up your balance and set up recurring payments as a customer.

Why a prepaid system?

Prepaid systems are an industry standard for domain registries and wholesale domain registrars. As a wholesale registrar, this system allows us to continue operating without any hassles at the volumes we do.

A prepaid system also allows us to keep our financial department lean. This means that we get to invest more in developing the best possible products and services for our customers.

How it works

When you create an account with Openprovider, you’ll choose a preferred currency for your transactions – options include EUR, USD, GBP, INR, or RUB. Once your account setup is complete, you can add funds in your selected currency.

Your Openprovider balance will cover all your transactions, such as domain registrations, renewals, and other related operations, along with the registration and renewal of additional products and your Membership fees.

Each month, you will receive an invoice summarizing all your transactions from the previous month. This invoice will cover domain operations, product transactions, and Membership fees (if applicable), but will not reflect any funds you’ve added to your account or your remaining balance. If there are no transactions in a given month, no invoice will be sent.

A balance top-up is only a deposit to increase the prepaid account balance, without any product or service in return from Openprovider yet. This is why there are no invoices for top-ups and why it is not possible to add the top-ups as a “purchase order” in your accounting. We recommend opening a ledger account for Openprovider in your accounting. You can enter the payments and invoices here, making Openprovider an entry that owes you money, instead of the other way around. If this is not an option in your accounting solution, please contact your accounting solution to ask for assistance.

We highly recommend setting up automatic or recurring payments for seamless operations and maintaining a positive balance. You can learn more about how this works further down in this article.

How to top up your balance

Openprovider accepts the following payment methods: 

• Credit card
• PayPal
• JCB
• Diners Club
• iDeal (only available for Dutch and Belgian customers)
• Bancontact (only available for Belgian customers)
• Razorpay (only available for customers who have set their account currency to INR)
• Wire transfer (only available for European customers and upon request, click here to learn more)

All payments are processed by our partner Adyen, you may therefore see the name Adyen on the bank statements of your Openprovider transactions.

To top up your balance, log in to the control panel and click “Increase balance”.

Choose your payment method, enter the amount, and click “Add money”. In case of a credit card payment, you will be asked to verify the transaction with your bank before it is processed.

How to set up recurring payments

Openprovider offers two options for automatic or recurring payments: keeping a positive balance and scheduled payments.

If you always want to maintain a certain balance on your account, keeping a positive balance is a great choice. When you turn on this feature, your account will automatically be topped up with a set amount when your balance passes a certain threshold.

For example, if you want to keep your balance at €500, and you set up an automatic payment of €200, this means that your balance will automatically be topped up with €200 every time it drops below €500.

Meanwhile, if you opt for scheduled payments, you can set a specific amount to be added to your balance every defined number of days. This option works best for customers with a stable portfolio with a regular spending pattern at Openprovider.

You can set up both automated payment options by logging in to the control panel and going to Account → Financial → Recurring payments. Please note, you can only set up recurring payments for credit card, PayPal, or iDeal transactions. 

To avoid the unwanted expiration or cancellation of any of your products, we strongly recommend setting your threshold or scheduled payment above the price of the most expensive product or domain renewal in your portfolio. Keep an eye out for low-balance warnings and reminders about upcoming renewals, even when using this method.

You can cancel recurring payments anytime – simply move to Account → Financial → Recurring payments in the control panel to turn off the recurring payment.

Questions?

Our team is always available to help with questions about billing and payments. You can contact us here.