How to collect billing details in Stripe Checkout?

How to Collect Billing Details in Stripe Checkout

 

Step 1: Set Up Your Stripe Account

 

Before implementing Stripe Checkout to collect billing details, you need to have a Stripe account. If you don't have one already, follow these steps:

• Go to stripe.com and sign up for an account
• Verify your email address and complete the account setup
• Access your API keys from the Stripe Dashboard under Developers > API keys

You'll need both your publishable key and secret key for implementation.

 

Step 2: Install Stripe Libraries

 

Depending on your technology stack, you'll need to install the appropriate Stripe libraries:

For Node.js:

npm install stripe @stripe/stripe-js

For PHP:

composer require stripe/stripe-php

For Python:

pip install stripe

For Ruby:

gem install stripe

 

Step 3: Create a Checkout Session (Backend)

 

Next, you'll need to create a server-side endpoint that creates a Checkout Session. Here's how to do it in Node.js with Express:

const express = require('express');
const app = express();
const stripe = require('stripe')('sk_test_your_secret_key');

app.post('/create-checkout-session', async (req, res) => {
  try {
    const session = await stripe.checkout.sessions.create({
      payment_method_types: ['card'],
      mode: 'subscription', // or 'payment' for one-time payments
      billing_address_collection: 'required', // Collect billing address
      customer\_email: req.body.email, // Pre-fill email if available
      line\_items: [
        {
          price: 'price\_1234567890', // Your price ID from Stripe
          quantity: 1,
        },
      ],
      success_url: 'https://your-website.com/success?session_id={CHECKOUT_SESSION_ID}',
      cancel\_url: 'https://your-website.com/cancel',
    });

    res.json({ url: session.url });
  } catch (error) {
    res.status(500).json({ error: error.message });
  }
});

app.listen(3000, () => console.log('Server running on port 3000'));

The key parameter here is billing_address_collection: 'required', which ensures that Stripe Checkout will collect the customer's billing address.

 

Step 4: Redirect to Checkout (Frontend)

 

Now, create a button that redirects users to the Checkout page when clicked:

  
  
  
  


  Subscribe Now

  

 

Step 5: Customize Billing Details Collection

 

You can customize what billing information is collected by adding additional parameters to your Checkout Session creation:

const session = await stripe.checkout.sessions.create({
  // Other parameters...
  billing_address_collection: 'required', // or 'auto' to make it optional
  
  // Specify which address fields to collect
  customer_address_collection: {
    line1: 'required',
    line2: 'optional',
    city: 'required',
    state: 'required',
    postal\_code: 'required',
    country: 'required',
  },
  
  // To collect phone number:
  phone_number_collection: {
    enabled: true,
  },
});

Note: The customer_address_collection configuration shown above is for illustration. In practice, Stripe's default collection settings will handle most use cases.

 

Step 6: Handle the Successful Payment

 

After a successful payment, the customer will be redirected to your success URL. To retrieve the billing details, you can fetch the Checkout Session using the session ID:

// Server-side code (e.g., in your /success route handler)
app.get('/success', async (req, res) => {
  const { session\_id } = req.query;
  
  try {
    const session = await stripe.checkout.sessions.retrieve(session\_id, {
      expand: ['customer', 'line\_items'],
    });
    
    // Access the billing details
    const billingDetails = {
      name: session.customer\_details.name,
      email: session.customer\_details.email,
      address: session.customer\_details.address,
      phone: session.customer\_details.phone,
    };
    
    // Now you can store these details in your database or use them as needed
    console.log('Billing details:', billingDetails);
    
    res.render('success', { billingDetails });
  } catch (error) {
    console.error('Error:', error);
    res.status(500).send('Error retrieving session details');
  }
});

 

Step 7: Set Up Webhooks to Handle Asynchronous Events

 

Webhooks are crucial for reliable payment processing. They allow Stripe to notify your application when events happen, such as successful payments or failed payment attempts:

// Server-side webhook handler
app.post('/webhook', express.raw({ type: 'application/json' }), async (req, res) => {
  const sig = req.headers['stripe-signature'];
  const endpointSecret = 'whsec_your_webhook_signing_secret';
  
  let event;
  
  try {
    event = stripe.webhooks.constructEvent(req.body, sig, endpointSecret);
  } catch (err) {
    console.error(`Webhook Error: ${err.message}`);
    return res.status(400).send(`Webhook Error: ${err.message}`);
  }
  
  // Handle specific events
  switch (event.type) {
    case 'checkout.session.completed':
      const session = event.data.object;
      
      // Retrieve the session with customer details expanded
      const retrievedSession = await stripe.checkout.sessions.retrieve(session.id, {
        expand: ['customer', 'line\_items'],
      });
      
      // Access and store billing details
      const customer = retrievedSession.customer;
      const billingDetails = retrievedSession.customer\_details;
      
      console.log('Customer completed checkout with billing details:', billingDetails);
      
      // Fulfill the order, update your database, etc.
      break;
      
    case 'invoice.paid':
      // Handle successful recurring payments (for subscriptions)
      break;
      
    default:
      console.log(`Unhandled event type: ${event.type}`);
  }
  
  res.status(200).json({ received: true });
});

 

Step 8: Testing Your Implementation

 

Before going live, thoroughly test your implementation:

• Use Stripe test keys (starting with pk_test_ and sk_test_)
• Use Stripe's test card numbers (e.g., 4242 4242 4242 4242)
• Test different scenarios (successful payments, failed payments, etc.)
• Verify that billing details are correctly collected and stored

 

Step 9: Going Live

 

Once you've tested your implementation and everything works as expected, switch to your live API keys:

// Replace test keys with live keys
const stripe = require('stripe')('sk_live_your_live_secret\_key');

Make sure to also update your webhook endpoint with the live webhook signing secret.

 

Step 10: Additional Customization Options

 

Stripe Checkout offers several additional customization options for collecting billing details:

const session = await stripe.checkout.sessions.create({
  // Other parameters...
  
  // Customize the appearance
  payment_intent_data: {
    description: 'Premium Subscription',
    statement\_descriptor: 'YOUR BRAND NAME', // Will appear on customer's statement
  },
  
  // Localize the checkout page
  locale: 'auto', // or 'fr', 'de', 'ja', etc.
  
  // Customize the checkout look and feel
  custom\_text: {
    submit: {
      message: 'We'll email your receipt and instructions after payment',
    },
  },
  
  // Pre-fill customer details if you have them
  customer\_email: '[email protected]',
  
  // For collecting tax information
  tax_id_collection: {
    enabled: true,
  },
});

 

Conclusion

 

By following these steps, you've implemented Stripe Checkout with comprehensive billing details collection. The customer's billing information will be securely collected and made available to your application for order fulfillment, shipping, and record-keeping purposes. Stripe's secure, pre-built checkout flow handles all the complexity of payment forms, validation, and compliance while providing you with the customer details you need.