If auto-pilot is not active for your group then you will need to submit your payment manually, which can only happen after your group hits its tipping point. Pay By Group will send you an email notification with a link to your group’s dashboard when that happens. When you navigate to the dashboard from that email you should see that the “Make Purchase” button has turned blue, which means it’s active. Just click the button to get started!
On the top of the Make Purchase page, the name of the product or service you are purchasing, its total cost, and whether or not the inventory is being held for you will be displayed.
Below that there will be a summary of the group breakdown — how much you and the other members are contributing, and the schedule of payments if your purchase includes installments. If it does, you will have the option to see the summary for both the current payment and the overall purchase.
Below the group summary the total amount being charged to your card for that payment and the last four digits of the card you’re using to pay will be displayed. Underneath that the rest of the group’s payments will be shown, broken down on a per-contributor basis.
Finally, on the right side of the page there will be a small sidebar which shows you what’s being paid to the business and includes the blue “Complete purchase” button. When you’re ready, click it to submit payment.
A window will pop up noting that the purchase is in progress. Click the “Cool!” button to be taken back to your dashboard. As that happens, the Pay By Group system will attempt to authorize everyone’s credit cards for their respective contribution amounts.
If one or more credit cards failed to authorize, an error message will appear at the top of your dashboard with information about what happened. There will also be links to information about how the various ways you can handle this situation, and you can read more about resolving such member payment issues in this article.
If all cards authorize successfully, one of two messages will be shown on your dashboard:
- If the business has chosen to review your purchase before accepting payment, there will be a notification that your purchase is pending. Once the business accepts your payment, Pay By Group will send you and your group members confirmation of your successful purchase and your receipts.
- If the business automatically accepts payments, you’ll simply see a notification that the group has completed and the purchase has been made. All pertinent notifications, i.e. receipts, will also be automatically sent as mentioned above.
If you don’t see any of the above notifications immediately, refresh the page in your browser for an updated message.