WePay API Pricing

WePay's basic pricing structure is very straightforward. We charge*:

Can I pass a percentage fee to WePay instead of a dollar amount?

No, the app_fee parameter must be a dollar amount. It is easy to calculate the necessary dollar amount using a little math on your side, though.

In this example, P is the desired total percentage fee (WePay percentage fee + App percentage fee). C is the original cost of the good or service before fees.

amount = (1 + P) × C

WePay assesses fees on the whole amount of the charge. Here, W is the dollar amount of WePay’s fees.

W = (0.029 × amount) + 0.3
W = (0.029 × ((1 + P) × C)) + 0.3

The dollar amount of the App fee, then, is just the total amount of the charge minus the cost of the good or service (C) minus WePay’s fees (W).

app_fee = amount − C − W

We can then substitute for the amount and W so that the app_fee is only dependent on our original parameters.

app_fee = ((1 + P) × C) − C − ((0.029 × ((1 + P) × C)) + 0.3)

That reduces to:

app_fee = (0.971C × (1 + P)) − C − 0.3

Thus, if the original cost of the good or service is $40 (C = 40) and the desired percentage fee is 6% (P = .06), app_fee is easy to calculate:

app_fee = (0.97(40) × (1 + .06)) − 40 −0.3 = 0.828

How can I charge WePay's fee to the payee, and the app_fee to the payer?

The WePay fee is always assessed on the gross amount of the charge. Let’s assume that the original cost of a good or service is $100, and your app wants to charge a $5 app fee.

In this /checkout/create call, you just need to set the amount parameter equal to $105, the app_fee equal to $5, and the fee_payer to ‘payee,’ so that all fees will come out of the gross amount. The relevant parameters should look like this:

{
  "amount":105,
  "app_fee":5,
  "fee_payer":"payee"
}

How can I charge the app_fee to the payee, and WePay's fee to the payer?

The WePay fee is always assessed on the gross amount of the charge. Since we want to charge this fee to the payer, we have to add it to the original cost of the good or service and set the fee_payer parameter equal to "payee".

If C is the original cost (including App fees to be taken from the payee), and W is the dollar amount of WePay fees, the gross amount to be charged (in this scenario) can be written as:

amount = C + W

Since WePay fees are also dependent on the gross amount, this can be expanded to:

amount = C + 0.029(amount) + 0.3

If we solve this equation for the gross amount we get:

amount = (C + 0.3)/(0.971)

Let's assume that the original cost of a good or service (including app fees) is $100, and your app wants to charge a $5 app fee. Here we can solve for the amount parameter:

amount = (100 + 0.3)/(0.971) = 103.29

The relevant parameters should look like this:

{
  "amount":103.29,
  "app_fee":5,
  "fee_payer":"payee"
}