Stripe Series Summary
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Your Cheat Sheet to Mastering Payment Automation with Stripe

ByTomas Zezula

More than two months ago, I embarked on a journey to create a hands-on series about payment automation using Stripe. Writing the series has been an enjoyable and rewarding experience, and now the time has come to wrap it up. I hope you’ll find this final post useful. It summarizes all the essential points and provides links to the original articles, which are filled with detailed explanations and code examples. Consider it a cheat sheet that you can use as a point of reference at your convenience. Thank you for following along, and for all your insightful comments.

Disclaimer: I am not affiliated with Stripe. All insights shared in this article are based on my personal experience and opinions.

Table of Contents

Benefits Of Using Stripe

Source: Stripe
  • Payment as a Service: Robust platform supporting one-time payments, subscription models and complex billing scenarios.
  • API First Approach: Comprehensive API and libraries in mainstream languages to simplify integration with the platform.
  • Reporting and Analytics: Real-time reports about transactions. Advanced tools to understand patterns and performance.

Looking for more details? This article provides a comprehensive overview.

Setting Up a Stripe Account

Stripe’s global presence varies; check if your country is supported or explore options for unsupported countries.

Go to the Stripe website and sign up.

  • Provide email, full name, password.
  • Confirm the verification link sent to your email.
  • Enter your business details.

Enable 2FA for added security.

Looking for a step-by-step guide? This article has full details.

Fetching API Keys

Note your publishable and secret key. Secure your API keys to prevent unauthorized access to your Stripe data.

Stripe is an API driven platform.

Publishable Key

  • Used in client-side code
  • Can only create tokens
  • Cannot directly charge a card

Secret Key

  • Works on the server side
  • Interacts directly with Stripe
  • Sensitive operations and charges

Setting Up Java SDK

Maven

Gradle

Replace LATEST_VERSION with the actual latest version number.

Note: Stripe supports various languages and platforms, including Python, PHP, JavaScript, Go, .NET, and more.

Java SDK Authentication

import com.stripe.Stripe;

Stripe.apiKey = "sk_test_yourSecretKeyHere";

Do not hard-code your keys. Use environment variables or configuration files.

Curious to learn more? Check this article for details and code examples.

Collecting Payments

PaymentIntent represents intent to collect payment from a customer, detailing amount and currency.
Create a separate PaymentIntent for each order or customer session.

  • Initiate with the intended charge amount and currency.
  • User payment details are collected on the front-end.
  • Customer confirms payment method and purchase.
  • Stripe provides Stripe.js to securely handle this process.
  • Payment method fully processed.
  • PaymentIntent reaches succeeded state, indicating successful payment.
  • Asynchronous operation via a webhook, event `payment_intent.succeeded`.

Looking to build a payment system with Stripe? This article provides guidance and code examples.

Handling Webhooks

  • A new event occurs (invoice created).
  • Stripe collects event details and sends a request to the registered endpoint.
  • Your system receives the request at the endpoint.
  • Your system acknowledges the receipt (200 OK) and acts on the event (update customer).
  • Register your endpoint in the dashboard.
  • Use the signing secret in your application.
  • Keep your signing secret safe!
  • Intercept the HTTP request at the endpoint.
  • Extract the payload from the request body.
  • Extract the provided signature header.
  • Verify the request using the signing secret.
  • If successful, the payload is transformed to an Event.

Note: Webhook events should be processed asynchronously. Never block the request! Instead, immediately respond with a 2xx code and process the event in the background.

Ready to take a deep dive that helps you avoid common mistakes? This article got you covered.

Preventing Duplicate Charges

  • Stripe API calls are not idempotent by default!
  • Payments should happen exactly once.
  • Generate a random key and include it in the Idempotency-Key header via setIdempotencyKey method in the Java SDK.
  • Beware! Same key must be passed in the retry loop. Otherwise, the Stripe won’t identify duplicated requests and the customer may be charged multiple times!

Network disruptions and timeouts lead to failed API calls. Implement reliable retries with exponential backoff. Yet, it’s crucial to ensure that the customer will be charged at most once. This article has full details.

Looking to maximise your chance of receiving a payment while keeping your customers happy? Check this article for details and code examples.

Recovering From Failures

Source: Stripe
  • Use HTTP status codes to intercept failures.
  • Parse JSON payload to understand the error.

Key elements in an error response:

  • type: api_error, card_error etc.
  • code: Helps understand the error – invalid_number
  • message: A descriptive message providing more details.

Common exceptions in Stripe’s Java SDK:

  • ApiException: Unexpected error, usually an issue with the Stripe service. Happens rarely.
  • ApiConnectionException: Network connectivity issue between your server and Stripe.
  • AuthenticationException: Your API key is either incorrect or lacks permissions for the requested operation.
  • CardException: Issue with card processing, such as declined payments or fraudulent flags.
  • InvalidRequestException: Your request contains invalid parameters. This can be mitigated by using type-safe parameters in the Java SDK.
  • RateLimitException: Too many requests were made in a short period of time. This can be mitigated by implementing retries.

Worried about edge cases and how to handle them? This article provides guidance on error handling and recovery.

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