Giropay

Learn about Giropay, a common payment method in Germany.

EPS and Giropay used to be payment methods only for their respective national markets. Both reach out to establish online payments in e-commerce in Europe based on the approved high-security standards of online banking.

Because of that, EPS and Giropay interlink their systems for interoperability. Merchants can now receive payments from customers from Germany using the already implemented EPS-interface without technical effort.

Payment typeOnline banking
MarketGermany
Customer currenciesEUR
Processing currenciesEUR
One-time PaymentNo
RefundsNo

General flow

The status of the transaction is pending during redirect.

status=2000&errormessage=pending&redirect_url=https://routing.epsgiropay.com/...

As soon customer completes the payment:

  1. Customer is redirected to the url_return page sent in the original request.
  2. An asynchronous notification to the notification_url is sent in the original request which can be used to update the shops database.
    errorcode=0&payment_state=not_credited_yet
  3. When the bank transfer from the customer bank reaches the bank account a second notification is sent to the notification_url errorcode=0&payment_state=credited

Step 1. Make a transaction request

From your server, make a POST /payment_preauthorize request.

POST https://sandbox.payabl.com/pay/backoffice/payment_preauthorize

Include in request:

ParameterFormatDescription
merchantid40 charactersMerchant identification number assigned during account creation
orderidmax. 40 charactersThe field orderid is optional and exclusively for the merchants' convenience
amountdigits only, either no decimals or two decimal places (e.g. 8 or 8.50)Transaction’s total amount that will be deducted from the customer
currency3 characters. ISO 4217The currency field contains the alpha-3 currency code for the transaction. Links to ISO
payment_method118payabl. Payment methods IDs
signature40 charactersSignature Calculation
country3 characters. ISO 3166-1 alpha-3Customer countries. List of official country codes
emailmax. 50 charactersCustomer email. An RFC 822 compliant email address
firstnamemax. 50 charactersFirst name of the customer
lastnamemax. 50 charactersLast name of the customer
url_returnmax. 255 characters starting with http or httpsURL for customer redirection

You can see a full list of parameters in Pre-Authorization.

Request example:

merchantid=gateway_test&orderid=Payabl-Test&amount=19.99&currency=EUR&payment_method=118&language=en&[email protected]&firstname=John&
lastname=Doe&zip=3035&street=Olympion&house=23&city=Limassol&country=CYP&customerip=93.109.250.238&url_return=https://yourshop.example/thank_you&
notification_url=https://yourshop.example/notification&url_success=https://yourshop.example/payment_successful&url_failed=https://yourshop.example/
payment_failed&signature=751db6a0a131215cb272fec013d0850d6a544f07

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Public Sandbox information

Do not use your personal email address, Order ID with sensitive information, real customer details and credit card data in the public Sandbox. For email field you may use [email protected].

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Redirection to url_return does not confirm that the transaction is successful. Always check the transaction via notification_url or use diagnose interface to get the final status of the transaction.

Step 2. Handle the redirect

To complete the payment, you need to redirect the customer to the correct URL in the response.

Response example:

transactionid=105153378&transid=105153378&status=2000&errormessage=pending&errmsg=pending&amount=19.99&price=19.99&
currency=EUR&orderid=Payabl-Test&iban=&bic=&account_name=&country=&user_id=466838&redirect_url=https%3A%2F%2Fsandbox.
payabl.com%2Fpay%2F56ef57fb29dbd2dca81c471bf84a04a4693c86fe%2Fpayment%2Fredirect_to_bank

Response fields reference:

ParameterDescription
transactionidpayabl. internal transaction id. Please use this transaction id when referring to the transaction in communications with the payabl. team
transidThe same as transactionid
statusTransaction error code
errormessageBrief explanation of transaction decline reason (empty on success)
errmsgThe same as errormessage
amountTransaction amount
priceThe same as amount
currencyTransaction currency
orderidOptional transaction identifier given by the merchant
redirect_urlURL for customer redirection to finalize the payment (URL encoded)
user_idPayment system user identifier

Step 3. Receive the final status

Once the customer completes the payment, we will send a notification with the transaction's status to the notification_url specified by you.

url_return and notification_url should be passed by you in the Pre-authorization request.

Alternatively, you can communicate a notifciation_url to be used by default to payabl. technical team. By doing so, you won't need to send it in every request.

Giropay contains an additional notification parameter which is payment_state, which could contain the following values:

  • not_credited_yet: Capture - Accepted.
  • credited: Capture - Successful.
  • not_credited: Capture - Failed.

Each state change would trigger a notification to the notification URL, either provided in the request body or configured when the merchant account was created.

Notification example - Accepted Capture:

orderid=Payabl-Test&errormessage=&security=c6c541af55c337c7b094c3d1e332c9fd450a4975f12e3e4ae6bc5839ab24a278&
type=capture&transactionid=105153378&payment_state=not_credited_yet&errorcode=0&timestamp=1682688182

Notification example - Successful Capture:

amount=19.99&errorcode=0&payment_state=credited&timestamp=1682688605&type=capture&transactionid=105153378&orderid=Payabl-Test&
security=c9f35d9f262d5939235eb7515aa08407c72533ed4824e36a8d08ab8bf8060a71&errormessage=

Notification fields reference:

ParameterDescription
transactionidpayabl. internal transaction id. Please use this transaction id when referring to the transaction in communications with the payabl. team
typeTransaction type
errorcodeTransaction error code (0 for success)
errormessageBrief explanation of transaction decline reason (empty on success)
amountTransaction amount
orderidOptional transaction identifier given by the merchant
securitySignature to verify the authenticity of the notification. You can find more information here
timestampNotification timestamp
payment_stateTransaction acceptance state as described above

Additional Customer details can be added to both callbacks. Please contact Tech support to enable them:

ParameterDescription
bank_countryCustomer bank country in ISO-3166 alpha-2 format
bicCustomer bank BIC
payment_systemIdentify if EPS or Giropay was used
account_holderAccount holder name
ibanCustomer IBAN

Notification example - Accepted Capture (additional parameters):

errormessage=&timestamp=1669899829&transactionid=105153456&account_holder=Muster+Mann&bic=STZZATWWXXX&security=72e1a33
74be4e76bfabadd587ed9e840a180c0b827a562d9dd357db7222207bc&errorcode=0&payment_state=not_credited_yet&iban=DE978900000001100243&
payment_system=giropay&type=capture&bank_country=DE&orderid=Payabl-Test

Notification example - Successful Capture (additional parameters):

payment_state=credited&orderid=Payabl-Test&security=6df735e958d57993278c7be571c4452640adb87b97cbf53bd557b4adfbd72023&
timestamp=1669900507&errormessage=&iban=DE978900000001100243&errorcode=0&transactionid=105153456&amount=19.99&
bic=STZZATWWXXX&bank_country=DE&account_holder=Muster+Mann&type=capture

When the customer finished or canceled the payment, he will be redirected back to url_return, provided by you in the initial request to payment_preauthorize. After that, you will receive a notification, posted to notification_url, with the final transaction status, which you suppose to use to update your system.

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Notification URL can be configured by our tech support team in your account on our side,
or you can send it as a parameter notification_url in the initial request to payment_preauthorize.

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In case 15 days pass and payabl. didn't receive any funds from an issuer, the transaction will be failed automatically. You will receive a notification update.

Declines

Below you will find additional information on some common declines that can occur during a Giropay payment attempt.

Redirect timeout
In case the customer wasn't redirected to the Giropay interface to complete the payment within 1 hour and the redirect link got expired, the transaction will be failed with error 021 – Transaction not completed. We will post a notification to your notification_url.

errorcode=021&payment_state=not_credited&payment_system=giropay&type=order&iban=&errormessage=transaction+not+completed&
bic=&transactionid=105153974&security=2c6e4bdd42b987a51479360e38eae2c87aaad8d2&account_holder=&orderid=Payabl-Test

Transaction aborted
In case the customer has been successfully redirected to the Giropay interface, but aborted the payment in the process, pressed the browser back button, or performed other action that interrupted the process – the transaction will be failed and we will post a notification containing error code -1315 – Response failed to your notification_url.

iban=XX000&bank_country=DE&errorcode=-1315&transactionid=105153879&security=c5f4b290c233267ddfcd2785b3a3deec9af5ba52&
errormessage=Response+failed&payment_system=giropay&account_holder=&payment_state=not_credited&bic=STZZATWWXXX&type=order&
orderid=Payabl-Test

Funds not arriving within the waiting period

As it was described above, in cases where the transaction has been in not_credited_yet payment state for 15 days and payabl. still haven't received the funds from the customer's bank, the transaction will be failed automatically with error -6211 – No confirmation from bank, triggering a notification to your notification_url.

iban=DE978900000001100243&security=46c8730b2422a84ad8c3ab981e7d2fad909e476fd9af524842aed2c868f61d9e&type=capture&
errormessage=No+confirmation+from+bank&payment_system=eps&bank_country=DE&timestamp=1688169282&bic=STZZATWWXXX&payment_state=not_credited&
transactionid=105153988&account_holder=Muster+Mann&errorcode=-6211&orderid=Payabl-Test

Our Technical Support team is there to help you:
Email: [email protected]
Available Monday – Friday between 09:00 and 17:00 CET/CEST