We use Stripe to power the pledging process, and transfer funds to creators after a successful campaign.
Stripe is a payments platform that makes it easy to pledge to campaigns, and receive funds. All creators are required to set up a Stripe account when they create their Spacehive project. This is done under the 'Delivery' section of their project.
Read more about how to set up your Stripe account.
By setting up a Stripe account, backers can then pledge to campaigns using a debit/credit card (including Google and Apple Pay), BACS and Direct Debit.
When backing a campaign, the money is taken from the backer at that point and held by Stripe. If the campaign is successful, funds are transferred to the project team. If the campaign is unsuccessful, backers are refunded.
To receive payments via Stripe there is a fee for each transaction, which is deducted from each pledge that is made. The fee for card transactions is 2.9%, for BACS payments it is £0.80 and for Direct Debit payments it is 1% (min. £0.20, max. £2).
Transaction fees are calculated when you create your project and added to your crowdfunding target (along with the 7.5% Spacehive platform fee). This means that all fees are covered by your crowd.