PestBossPro Blog — Billing & Payments

Auto-Charging After Each Pest Control Service

A card on file only helps if it gets charged at the right time, for the right amount, without someone in the office remembering to do it. Auto-charge is the step that turns a stored card into a paid invoice.

The Card Is on File. Now What?

Getting the card in the first place is covered in Card on File at Sign-Up: Starting Every Pest Control Account With a Payment Method. This article is about what happens to it after each visit.

In PestBossPro you choose when the card on file is charged: when the job is completed, or on a schedule. For most residential pest control plans, charging on completion is the simplest. The tech taps Complete, the invoice is created from the services on the job, and the card is charged for that invoice. The customer gets their invoice and sees it in the customer app.

Charge on Completion or on a Schedule

Both approaches have a place:

• On completion ties each charge to a visit. The customer gets a $125 charge the day the quarterly service is done, with an invoice that says so. This is the easiest for customers to understand because every charge has a visit behind it.
• On a schedule charges at a set time, such as a regular monthly amount for a plan. Some companies like the predictable payment, and some customers like knowing exactly what will hit their card each month.

Whatever you choose, say it in the sign-up and on the estimate. “Charged after each visit” and “charged on the first of each month” are both fine. A customer who expected one and got the other is the problem. The trade-offs are covered in more depth in Per-Visit Billing or Monthly Billing for Pest Control Plans.

What Makes Auto-Charge Feel Safe to Customers

Customers accept automatic payments when three things are true: they know what they are paying for, they know when they will be charged, and they can see and change it themselves. PestBossPro covers each of those:

• What: every charge has an invoice with plain line items from your service list.
• When: the night-before reminder and the on-the-way and arrived texts tell them the visit is happening, so the charge that follows is no surprise.
• Control: in the customer app they see every invoice and can update their card.

Add the automatic post-treatment instruction email, which tells them how to care for the treated areas, and the customer has a clear record of each visit from start to finish.

What Should Not Auto-Charge

Auto-charge should never surprise anyone, which means some visits need to be set up so they do not charge the card:

• Re-services. If your policy is free re-services between scheduled visits, the re-service should be recorded on the account with no charge.
• Prepaid visits. A mosquito season or annual plan paid up front is applied against each visit as it is invoiced, so the card is not charged again.
• Monthly commercial accounts. Accounts set to Monthly get one statement for every location instead of a charge per visit.
• Work the customer has not approved. If a tech finds a problem that needs extra work, the customer approves the price first. Adding a charge after the fact and auto-charging it is the fastest way to lose a customer.

Skipped Visits Do Not Charge

Because the charge follows completion, a visit that does not happen does not charge. If the tech taps Skip because of rain, a locked gate or a dog in the yard, there is no invoice and no charge. The office sees the skip with the tech's note and can reschedule it. The customer is never billed for a visit that did not happen, which is one of the strongest arguments for charging on completion instead of on a fixed date.

For plans charged on a schedule, keep an eye on skipped visits during your month-end billing review so a customer is not paying for a quarter with no service in it.

When the Charge Fails

Some auto-charges will fail. The card expired, was replaced, or was over its limit. The invoice stays open and shows as unpaid, and the office follows up. The fastest fix is a text asking the customer to update their card in the customer app. The guide to declines,Declined Cards on Pest Control Accounts: What to Do the Same Day, lays out a routine for this.

Let the Work Trigger the Payment

Auto-charge works best when it follows the work: the visit happens, the invoice is created, the card is charged, and the customer can see all of it. Set each account to charge the way it should, keep re-services and prepaid visits from charging, and the office only has to deal with the occasional decline. For the rest of PestBossPro's billing tools, visit the pest control invoicing software page.