Billing overview
Sell game server hosting through your own panel.
Customers browse a store, order, and pay by card, by PayPal or with account credit.
License required
The billing module needs the Billing Module license add-on. Without this license, the Billing section does not appear in the admin sidebar. The store does not appear for customers.
Turn billing on
- Go to Admin > Settings > Features.
- Find the Billing System group.
- Turn on Enable Billing System.
- Click Save Changes.
The Billing section now appears in the admin sidebar. The store also becomes available to your customers.
The same group has three more switches:
| Switch | What it does |
|---|---|
| Enable Account Credits | Customers can hold an account balance and spend it on orders. |
| Allow Credit Overspend | A customer can order more than their balance covers. The panel raises an invoice for the rest. |
| Auto-Suspend on Non-Payment | The panel suspends a service when its invoice stays unpaid past the due date. |
The Payment Gateways group below it lists Stripe Payments, PayPal Payments, and Credit Balance Payments.
TIP
A gateway needs two steps. Turn its switch on here, then tick Enabled on its card in Admin > Billing > Settings > Gateways. Read Payment Gateways.
The billing section
The Billing section in the admin sidebar has seven pages:
| Page | Purpose |
|---|---|
| Overview | Revenue figures and recent activity. |
| Products | What you sell, and the price of each item. |
| Orders | Every order a customer placed. |
| Invoices | Every invoice the panel raised. |
| Credits | Add credit to a customer, or take credit away. |
| Coupons | Discount codes. |
| Settings | Currency, tax, and the automatic suspension timers. |
There is an eighth page, Services, that the sidebar does not list. To open it, click the Active Services card on the Overview page.
The overview page
Go to Admin > Billing. The page title is Billing Overview.
At the top right, four buttons set the period for the figures on the page: Today, Week, Month, and Year. The page opens on Month.
Revenue cards
The first row of cards shows:
- Today's Revenue, with the change against yesterday.
- This Month, with the change against last month.
- MRR, the monthly recurring revenue.
- ARR, the annual recurring revenue.
Activity cards
The second row of cards links to other pages:
- Orders Today opens the orders list.
- Pending Invoices shows the outstanding total, and a count of overdue invoices in amber.
- Active Services shows how many services are suspended.
- Pending Orders opens the orders list, filtered to orders that wait for processing.
Panels
Revenue Trend is a bar chart for the selected period. Hover over a bar to read the exact figure. When there is no data, the panel reads No revenue data available for this period.
Service Health shows the split between active and suspended services, and an uptime percentage.
Recent Orders lists the last five days that had orders. Click View all to open the orders list.
Billing settings
Go to Admin > Billing > Settings. Three tabs run across the top of this page: Settings, Gateways, and Appearance.
Click Save Settings after you change a value. The button reads Saved when the change is stored.
Currency settings
Default Currency is a dropdown with 19 currencies. Every price, invoice, and checkout page on the panel uses this currency. You cannot set a different currency for one product.
Currency Symbol overrides the symbol that goes with the currency you picked. Leave it alone unless you need a different symbol.
WARNING
Change the currency before you take your first order. The panel does not convert the prices that you already entered. A change of currency changes only the symbol next to them.
Tax settings
Turn on Enable Tax Collection to charge tax. Two more fields then appear:
- Tax Rate (%) takes a value from 0 to 100.
- Prices include tax controls how the panel treats the prices you entered. When this box is ticked, the price of a product already contains the tax. When the box is clear, the panel adds the tax on top of the price at checkout.
The invoice shows the tax on its own line, with the rate.
Order and service settings
| Setting | What it does |
|---|---|
| Auto-activate paid orders | The panel builds the server as soon as the payment clears. With this box clear, an admin processes each order by hand. |
| Require billing address | The checkout asks the customer for a billing address before they pay. With this box clear, the checkout does not ask for one. |
| Enable account credits | Customers can pay with their account balance. |
| Auto-suspend after (days) | The grace period after an invoice falls due. At the end of it, the panel suspends the service. The range is 0 to 30. The default is 3. |
| Auto-terminate after (days) | The period after a suspension. At the end of it, the panel terminates the service. The range is 0 to 90. The default is 14. |
For the full timeline from due date to termination, read Service Lifecycle.
Billing appearance
The Appearance tab controls how the billing area looks to your customers.
Billing Layout has two choices:
- Separate Portal gives billing its own header and navigation bar.
- Integrated puts billing in the main panel sidebar.
Theme Source has two choices. Use Panel Theme takes the colors from Admin > Appearance > Themes. Custom Billing Theme shows color pickers for brand colors, background colors, text colors, and status colors. It also shows a custom CSS box.
Click Preview to see your changes before you save them.
Next steps
- Products - build the things you sell
- Payment Gateways - take card and PayPal payments
- Orders and Invoices - process orders and refunds
- Service Lifecycle - suspension, termination, and cancellation