Setting billing frequency in trial period with PayPal HTML variables

Question

I would like to implement recurrent payments with a trial period with certain billing frequency (HTML Variables for Recurring Payments Buttons)

Example: trial period with a duration of three months with a certain price billed every month. Is that even possible?

There are three variables for a trial period:

a1: trial period price

p1: trial period duration

t1: trial period units of duration

If I set the duration to 3, and unit to M (month), and price to $100, PayPal charges the price amount for the 3 months combined. But I need recurrent charges frequency to be 1 month. So I need PayPal to charge the customer $100 each month for the first three months (trial period). How to achieve this with PayPal's recurrent payment variables?

pp_MSI_Jenn pp_MSI_Jenn · Accepted Answer · 2015-08-24T16:45:07

The closest that you can offer is two trial periods. The subscription buttons will not allow three trial periods.

This is because if you set your first trial for 3 months then your customer will only be charged $100.00 once and then three months later the trial expires. When it expires the regular subscription value starts.

With the second trial period you can specify two months for $200.00 but your customer would be charged $200.00 initially and then not charged again for two months.

You could offer an initial one month trial period where your customer pays $100.00 for the first trial and then $200.00 for the second trial.

Offering a second trial period is the closest to having them charged $100.00 a month initially.
Here is the sample code from the PayPal Developer Site modified slightly:

<form action="https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr" method="post">

<!-- Identify your business so that you can collect the payments. -->
<input type="hidden" name="business" value="[email protected]">

<!-- Specify a Subscribe button. -->
<input type="hidden" name="cmd" value="_xclick-subscriptions">

<!-- Identify the subscription. -->
<input type="hidden" name="item_name" value="Alice's Monthly Digest">
<input type="hidden" name="item_number" value="DIG Monthly">

<!-- Set the terms of the 1st trial period. -->
<input type="hidden" name="currency_code" value="USD">
<input type="hidden" name="a1" value="100.00">
<input type="hidden" name="p1" value="1">
<input type="hidden" name="t1" value="M">

<!-- Set the terms of the 2nd trial period. Below is for a 2 month period  -->
<input type="hidden" name="a2" value="200.00">
<input type="hidden" name="p2" value="2">
<input type="hidden" name="t2" value="M">

<!-- Set the terms of the regular subscription. -->
<input type="hidden" name="a3" value="250.99">
<input type="hidden" name="p3" value="1">
<input type="hidden" name="t3" value="M">

<!-- Set recurring payments until canceled. -->
<input type="hidden" name="src" value="1">

<!-- Display the payment button. -->
<input type="image" name="submit" border="0"
src="https://www.paypalobjects.com/en_US/i/btn/btn_subscribe_LG.gif"
alt="PayPal - The safer, easier way to pay online">
<img alt="" border="0" width="1" height="1"
src="https://www.paypalobjects.com/en_US/i/scr/pixel.gif" >
</form>

If you want more information on setting two trial periods, here is the documentation:
Setting Trial Periods

Setting billing frequency in trial period with PayPal HTML variables

1 Answers