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GoCardless Direct Debit

Kolva Club is a GoCardless Connect partner. Clubs connect their own GoCardless account in a few clicks; parents pay by Direct Debit (or pay instantly via Open Banking and set up DD in the same flow).

What this gives you

  • Lower fees on recurring payments — 1% capped at £4 per transaction (vs 1.5% + 20p on cards), plus Kolva's flat 0.75% platform fee.
  • Automatic monthly collection — once a mandate is set up, monthly fees collect on schedule with no parent action.
  • Smart retry (Success+) — if a payment fails (insufficient funds, etc.), GoCardless intelligently re-attempts based on success-rate models. We don't double-attempt from our own retry cron.
  • Fraud protection (Protect+) — GoCardless verifies each new mandate to flag suspicious sign-ups before any money moves.
  • Combined Pay & Set Up flow — the parent pays the first month instantly via their bank app and signs the BACS mandate in a single journey. Subsequent months collect via Direct Debit as normal.

Connecting GoCardless to your club

  1. Go to Settings → Payments in the Kolva Club admin.
  2. Find the GoCardless Connect card and click Connect GoCardless.
  3. You're redirected to GoCardless. Sign in to an existing GoCardless account or sign up — the form is pre-filled with your club's name, your name, and email so you can skim through.
  4. Authorize Kolva Club to act on your behalf for taking Direct Debit payments.
  5. You're returned to Kolva. The card now shows Connected & Verified when GoCardless has finished verifying your account.

While GoCardless is verifying you, the card shows Verification in review. You can still onboard parents during this period, though some payments may be held until verification completes. If GoCardless needs more info, the card switches to Action required with a link to your GoCardless dashboard.

How parents set up Direct Debit

Path A — DD-only setup

From Parent → Payments → Methods, the parent clicks Set Up Direct Debit. They're taken to a hosted GoCardless page (pre-filled with their name, email, and address from their Kolva profile), confirm their bank details, and sign the BACS mandate. Future monthly fees collect automatically.

Path B — Combined Pay & Set Up

When a parent has an outstanding payment AND no Direct Debit mandate yet, the parent payments page shows a Pay £X & set up Direct Debit card. One click takes them to GoCardless where they:

  1. Authenticate with their bank app (Open Banking).
  2. Authorize the first payment — funds clear in seconds.
  3. Sign the BACS mandate for future months — no extra forms.

This is GoCardless's recommended journey for first-time payers because it clears the immediate balance and locks in recurring collection in a single flow.

Fees

Two layers of fees on each Direct Debit payment:

  • GoCardless — 1% per transaction, capped at £4. Charged to your GoCardless account at settlement (T+3).
  • Kolva platform fee — flat 0.75%, taken automatically as app_fee on every payment. No monthly subscription, no hidden charges.

Worked example on a £50 monthly fee: GoCardless takes £0.50 + £0.20 = £0.70. Kolva takes 0.75% × £50 = £0.375. The club's GoCardless account receives £48.93 net of fees.

Refunds

From the admin payments page, click Refund on any paid Direct Debit transaction. You can refund the full amount or a partial amount. Refunds are sent back to the parent's bank account within 5 working days. Both the platform fee and processor fee are reversed automatically.

Troubleshooting

"Reconnection Required" on the GoCardless card

Your OAuth token has expired (we proactively refresh tokens, but very long gaps between admin logins can let one slip). Click Reconnect on the Settings → Payments card to re-authorize. This does not affect existing parent mandates.

A parent's mandate shows as "Pending"

New BACS mandates take 2-3 business days to become active. The parent's first payment will be scheduled after the mandate is confirmed.

A payment failed

Common causes: insufficient funds, account closed, bank-customer dispute. GoCardless's Success+ will automatically retry intelligent failures. If Success+ exhausts retries, the payment is marked Failed and you can take action from the admin payments page (manual chase, switch to card, mark as written off).

A payment was charged back

Under the Direct Debit Guarantee, parents can dispute a payment with their bank. We mark these as Refunded and notify you. If you believe the chargeback is incorrect, contact GoCardless support — they handle indemnity claims.

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