Customer Payment Accounts

A Customer Payment Account (CPA) stores the payment method references that instellix uses to charge, refund, or pay out a customer via a connected payment provider.

instellix is not a PSP and is not PCI in scope for card data: raw credit card numbers are never processed or stored (including not in memory). For PSP-managed methods, the CPA holds tokens / external references only.

If a customer has three cards, they typically have three CPAs — one per tokenized payment method.

Prerequisites

Create a Customer Payment Account

Go to: Billing > Customers > Customer Overview

  1. Open the customer Details page.
  2. Open the Customer Payment Accounts tab.
  3. Click Add and fill in the fields.
  4. Select the Merchant Payment Gateway.
  5. Save.

You can also create CPAs via the Customer Payment Account API.

A CPA is typically created when a payment-method / account token is available from the provider.

Fields

FieldMeaning
Payment methodInformational type (e.g. credit card, direct debit). Charging uses the provider references.
Payment provider referenceRequired. External ID of the customer/account at the PSP (e.g. Stripe cus_…, Adyen shopper reference, GoCardless Customer Id).
Payment method referenceOptional depending on the PSP. Stored payment method / mandate ID (e.g. Stripe pm_…, Adyen stored payment method Id, GoCardless Mandate Id).
Account holder nameName used for charging where required
Payment card typeCard brand if applicable
Display nameName shown on invoices (never full PAN/IBAN; e.g. **** **** **** 1234)
Account creation dateWhen the method was created at the PSP (e.g. SEPA mandate handling)
Merchant payment gatewayGateway that routes charging to the correct merchant account / currency
PropertiesOptional key/value pairs; may be forwarded to the provider integration when a payment is collected

Provider reference mapping

ProviderPayment provider referencePayment method reference
StripeStripe Customer ID (cus_…)Stripe PaymentMethod ID (pm_…)
Adyentokenization.shopperReferencetokenization.storedPaymentMethodId
GoCardlessCustomer IdMandate Id

Full provider setup:

Edit a Customer Payment Account

Go to: Billing > Customers > Customer Overview → customer DetailsCustomer Payment AccountsEdit

You can update references, account holder, gateway, display name, properties, and related fields.

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Changing PSP references (e.g. a new Stripe pm_…) changes which method is used for future Payment Intents on this CPA. Check open Payment Intent Tasks if charging has not run yet.

Health status

Each CPA has a health status (e.g. Good / Average / Poor). It starts healthy and is updated based on charging outcomes. If a method can no longer be charged (e.g. stolen card), health is set to poor so further collection attempts on that CPA can be avoided.

Operators can also adjust health status manually when a method is known to be unreliable.

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