multipliers×ai

Help for app owners

Setting up Stripe

Connect your own Stripe account so your businesses can pay you, and pay by card. It takes about 20–30 minutes. Stripe is optional: until you connect it, everything works with cash or check payments.

What you’ll need

  • A Stripe account in the United States (US Dollar, USD). Your owner console checks the country and currency when you connect.
  • About 20–30 minutes. About 15 of them are in your owner console; the rest is in Stripe.
  • Your sign-in for multipliers.ai, to open your owner console.

Who holds what

  • Connect your own Stripe account. Your businesses’ plan payments go to you, and their customers’ card payments go to them. Multipliers never handles this money.
  • multipliers.ai never sees your Stripe key and never holds your money.
  • Your businesses’ customers pay each business directly, into that business’s own Stripe account.
  • Plan payments from your businesses go into your Stripe account.
  • If you choose to take a fee on your businesses’ online payments, Stripe sends that fee to your Stripe account.
  • Stripe pays your balance out to your bank automatically.

Never share this key with anyone, including multipliers.ai staff. Paste it only into your owner console (Payments → Connect Stripe → Paste your key). We never ask for it by email, chat or phone.

In Stripe: your account and Connect

Your Stripe account

  1. Sign in to Stripe, or create a free Stripe account.Use the account you want your plan payments and fees to go to.
  2. To take real payments later, activate the account in Stripe: your business details, your identity and a bank account for payouts.Only you can enter these, and only in Stripe — we never fill them in for you. You can do everything in this guide in test mode first.

Turn on Connect

Skip this if Connect is already on. In Stripe’s Connect setup, choose these:

  1. In Stripe, open Connect and click “Get started”.Connect lets your businesses take payments under your Stripe account.
  2. How funds flow: choose “Sellers will collect payments directly”.Each business’s customers pay that business directly — the money never passes through you or us.
  3. Industry: choose “Business management software”.That’s what this app is to Stripe.
  4. Onboarding: choose “Onboarding hosted by Stripe”.Stripe collects each business’s details on its own secure pages.
  5. Dashboard for sellers: choose “Stripe Dashboard”.Each business manages refunds and payouts in their own Stripe Dashboard.
  6. Risk and loss liability: choose Stripe.Stripe covers fraud and negative balances, and each business pays Stripe’s fees — not you.

Optional: Stripe Tax

Optional: if you want tax added to the plan payments your businesses make to you, set up Stripe Tax in your own Stripe account (Settings → Tax). Stripe calculates the tax; this app never calculates or stores tax.

Create the restricted key

In Stripe’s menu this is under Developers → API keys. Open API keys in Stripe (test mode) (opens in a new tab)

The steps and the exact permissions differ by app. Pick your app at the top of this page for its list.

In your owner console

  1. Open your owner console and go to Payments. Press “Connect Stripe”.You open the owner console from your account on multipliers.ai: sign in, then press “Open owner console”.
  2. Before you start: tick off what you need.You have already done the Stripe part above.
  3. Test or live: choose “Test first (recommended)”.Test mode lets you try everything with Stripe’s test cards. You can go live later.
  4. Create your key: you have already made it. The console shows the same list, with the key name to copy.
  5. Paste your key: paste the key and press “Check my key”.If you signed in more than a few minutes ago, the console first asks you to confirm it’s you. We check the key with Stripe, then store it in your app’s own secret store.
  6. Result: each line says “✓ Done” or “✕ To do”.Fix any “To do” line in Stripe (open the key, then “Edit key”), then press “Check now” on Payments.

What the status means

Payments → “Your Stripe account” shows a status, and “Test mode” or “Live” once connected:

Connected
Your key works and has every permission it needs. Your Stripe is connected.
Missing permissions
Your key works, but one or more permissions are missing. The card names each one and its column. Online payments stay off until you fix them.
Key not working
Stripe no longer accepts the key (it was deleted, rolled or expired). New online payments pause; cash and manual records keep working. Create a new key and replace it.
Not connected
No Stripe account is connected yet. Everything works with cash or check payments until you connect one.
Disconnected
You disconnected Stripe. Online payments are off; you can connect again at any time.
Not available yet
Payments aren’t switched on for your app yet. Contact support.

After connecting

  1. Invite each business to set up payments: open the business in your owner console and press “Invite to set up payments”.The business finishes Stripe’s own setup in their app. Card payments switch on for a business once Stripe approves their details.
  2. Start plan billing: open a business and press “Start billing”.The business gets an email to add a card on Stripe’s secure page. Billing starts when they do.

Test mode and live

Start in test mode: in the “Test or live” step, choose “Test first (recommended)”. Test mode lets you try everything with Stripe’s test cards. You can go live later. No real money moves in test mode.

Live mode is switched on for each app separately. Until it is on for yours, the “Live” choice is greyed out and the console says: “Live payments aren’t switched on for your app yet.”

A one-step switch from a test connection to live isn’t in the owner console yet. When live payments are on for your app, email us and we’ll help you move over.

Help

Questions? Email multipliers@kiwana.ai.

We will never ask you for your Stripe keys or any password, by email or on a call.