A top-up is a one-time purchase that adds dollars to your wallet’s prepaid Top-Up Bucket. Top-ups are how you fund verifications without a subscription, or cover spikes on top of one.
You can spend top-up funds with no subscription
Section titled “You can spend top-up funds with no subscription”Prepaid top-up funds are immediately spendable — a subscription is a feature gate, not an access gate. An organization funded only by top-ups can run verifications with no subscription at all. (The one exception: if you subscribed and then canceled, your balance is frozen until you re-subscribe — see Subscription.)
Pick an amount
Section titled “Pick an amount”Open Billing → Add funds in the console. You can choose a preset or enter a custom amount in US dollars.
- Some presets include a checkout discount — where a preset is discounted you pay less than the face value, and your wallet is credited the full face value. The illustrative presets are
$50 → pay $50(no discount),$250 → pay $200, and$1,000 → pay $700. The console shows the “you saved $X” amount before you commit (and shows nothing saved when a preset has no discount). The exact preset face/charge pairs are configuration (BILLING_TOPUP_PRESETSin@rf/config) and may change. - Custom amounts fund 1:1 — an arbitrary amount adds exactly that many dollars to your wallet, with no discount.
Pay with Stripe
Section titled “Pay with Stripe”Submitting the form redirects you to Stripe Checkout, which handles the payment securely on Stripe’s domain. Pay with a saved card or a new one. Stripe handles 3D Secure (SCA) challenges automatically when your bank requires them. Tax is added by Stripe on top of the (already-discounted) charge — your wallet is only ever funded with the pre-tax face value.
When funds land in your wallet
Section titled “When funds land in your wallet”On a successful charge, the funds are written into your wallet as a grant_created transaction in the Top-Up Bucket. You’re redirected back to Billing with a success banner. The funds are immediately spendable and expire 365 days after they are added.
If your bank asks for additional authentication after you leave Checkout, the top-up shows as pending until the payment finalizes.
Receipts
Section titled “Receipts”Stripe emails a receipt to your billing address as soon as the charge succeeds. You can also see the charge as a row in Transactions and download the invoice from there.
Troubleshooting
Section titled “Troubleshooting”- Card was declined — try another card from Payment methods, or contact your bank if every card is declining.
- Charge succeeded but the funds aren’t in my wallet yet: wait a few seconds and reload. The confirmation lands moments after the redirect. If the funds still don’t show after a minute, see Pending recharges.
- Top-up shows as
requires_action— Stripe needs you to complete an authentication step. Open the recovery link from the Stripe email. - Test mode — see Test mode and live mode. Test-mode top-ups do not bill and funds are isolated from live mode.