The Purchase transaction process enables purchasing something. This can be a physical item or digital item. It can be unique or have lots of stock. The something does not need to be an item at all; pre-packaged services or consultations work too.

Purchase transaction settings are configured when you create your Listing type. Learn more about how to configure a Listing type to suit what is being purchased and sold on your marketplace.

The rest of this article details how Purchase transactions happen for customers, providers, and operators (admins).

Customers purchase items from the listing page (1). If the item only has one delivery method or no delivery method, there is nothing for the customer to choose. Otherwise, customers can use a drop-down selector to choose between pickup and shipping (2). If an item for sale has more than one item in stock, the customer can choose how much they are purchasing. When the customer has chosen their delivery method (or if there is no choice) and their quantity and click the buy now button, they proceed to checkout.

The checkout process looks different depending on the delivery method or if there is non. If shipping is chosen, the users will see a screen where they can select their shipping address (1), payment method (2), send additional information as a message (3), and see the price breakdown with the shipping cost included (4). The fixed shipping costs are added by a provider when creating a listing.

When using the pickup delivery method, the checkout screen is a bit different. The customer sees the pickup address (5), payment method selection (6), the option to add additional information as a message (7), and the price breakdown (8) Payment is made when the customer click on “Confirm and pay” button (9). After this, customers see the order details page where further messages can be exchanged (10) and the item(s) can be marked as received (11).

If no delivery method is available for the listing, the customer will see the same screen without a pickup location.

You can see screenshots of the different steps below.

Steps 1-2: Customer selecting delivery method

Steps 1-4: Customer checkout with shipping as delivery method

Steps 5-9: Customer checkout with pickup as delivery method

Steps 10-11: Customer checked out successfully

Once a purchase is made, providers receive a notification both via email as well as on the marketplace as a notification. They can review the details and prepare the product for shipment, delivery, or pickup as needed. If there is no delivery method, you can agree on how to deliver the item or service through the messaging feature. For example, with Digital files.

After a purchase is made, the stock is adjusted. If the customer purchases many items, they are automatically subtracted from the available stock unless the Stock type is set to infinite. With a stock quantity of 1 in a listing, once the item has been purchased, the listing automatically closes to prevent additional purchases.

Providers can see all the purchases in the provider Inbox. They can access the newest purchase by clicking on it (1).

This takes them to the provider's order details page. Here they can also see the price breakdown, including the marketplace fee (2) as well as shipping details, if applicable. The provider can also send a message (3) to the customer and mark the bike as delivered (4). After selling the listing, the provider sees a confirmation page (5).

On the customer's side, they will be able to see that the purchase has been accepted, continue sending messages if needed and mark the bike as delivered (6). After the customer has marked the listing as received, both parties can write reviews (7).

You can see the screenshots of these steps below.

Step 1: Provider in their Inbox

Steps 2-4: Provider at the transaction page

Step 5: Provider marked the bike as delivered

Step 6: Customer sees update and marks bike as received

Step 7: After marking the bike as delivered/received, users can leave each other a review

Sharetribe allows you to act on behalf of your users if needed. In the default product purchase transaction process, there are three options (8): cancelling a transaction after it has been purchased, and either cancelling the transaction or marking it as received after a dispute has occurred. Cancelling the transaction includes refunding the Stripe payment.

These actions are taken from the Console. You need to navigate to the transaction in question, and then choose the action from the right hand side (9). The transaction needs to be in the appropriate stage for these options to become available, and you need to confirm the action you are taking through a separate window (10). Whenever you move the transaction forward, you can see confirmation that the operation was successful from the timeline and activity logs (11).

You can see screenshots of the process below.

Step 8 (optional): available operator actions in the transaction process

Step 9: Choose the operator action (here, we choose 'cancel')

Step 10: Confirm the operator action

Step 11: See the completed transition in the timeline and activity log

Purchase transactions include online payments and payouts via Stripe. Events in the purchase transaction trigger Stripe to perform different payment-related actions.

Learn more about the payment and payout features of Stripe.

A customer’s card is charged and funds taken from their bank account immediately upon checkout. The funds are moved to your Stripe platform account. Your commission fee is immediately available for use, while the remaining balance (the provider’s earnings) are held.

The provider’s earnings are held in your platform Stripe account until they are paid out or refunded. Though rules vary by country, funds can typically be held for up to 90 days in your Stripe platform account.

The provider is paid out their earnings when the transaction is marked as received. Transactions can be marked received in several ways:

When an order is marked as received, a payout of the provider’s earnings is triggered in Stripe. Payouts may take up to 7-10 business days to reach the provider’s account after being triggered.

Purchases can be disputed by the customer or operator after a transaction is marked delivered and before it is marked received.

Disputed transactions can then be cancelled by the operator. Disputed transactions are also cancelled automatically by the system 60 days after the transaction is disputed, if no other action takes place. When a transaction is cancelled, a full refund including the marketplace’s commission is initiated through Stripe to the customer.

Transactions can also be cancelled by the operator after the customer makes the purchase and before any other steps, such as marking the transaction received or delivered, are taken. Transactions will automatically cancel after 14 days if no other steps are taken by the provider, customer, or operator after the purchase.

In sum, payments by the customer are refunded in full under these conditions:

Email notifications are sent to the customer and provider as the transaction steps unfold. Your marketplace sends these notifications automatically. It uses a default template and texts, which you can edit using the Email texts editor. It is not possible without coding to add or remove the default transaction email notifications.

Learn more about every email sent during a purchase transaction.

You can see how Purchase transactions work by testing in your marketplace. Follow the testing tutorial to learn how to create your test user, listing, and transaction to learn more about how your marketplace works.