GoCardless Direct Debit

GoCardless powers UK Direct Debit billing for Aestheticc memberships. Clients authorise a mandate once; you collect automatically every month.

No competitor in the aesthetics CRM space (Fresha, Phorest, Cliniko, Glowday) offers Direct Debit. It's meaningfully cheaper and stickier than card billing.

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Why Direct Debit Over Cards

| | Direct Debit | Card | |--|-------------|------| | Typical fee | ~1% | ~1.4% + 20p | | Client cancels by losing card | No | Yes | | Failed payment retry | Automatic | Manual chase required | | Setup friction | One-time mandate | Card details expire / change |

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How It Works

1. Connect GoCardless — OAuth flow in Settings → Integrations → GoCardless. Takes about 5 minutes.
2. Client authorises a mandate — they complete a short Direct Debit authorisation (name, bank details, sort code / account number). This is a one-time step.
3. Automatic billing — each membership cycle, payment is collected against the mandate automatically. GoCardless handles retries on failure.

Mandate authorisation is handled by GoCardless's hosted flow — you never see or store client bank details.

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Connecting GoCardless

Go to Settings → Integrations → GoCardless and click Connect with GoCardless.

You'll be redirected to GoCardless to authorise the integration. After completing the OAuth flow, you're redirected back to Aestheticc with the connection active.

GoCardless operates a sandbox mode for testing before going live.

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Managing Mandates

Each client with a Direct Debit membership has a mandate on their client record. You can see mandate status (pending, active, cancelled) and payment history from the GoCardless tab on the client record.

Mandate statuses:

• Pending submission — authorised but not yet confirmed by the bank
• Active — ready to collect payments
• Cancelled — mandate revoked; a new one must be created

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Recurring Billing

Once a mandate is active, membership payments are collected automatically. GoCardless handles:

• Advance notification to the client (required by UK Direct Debit scheme)
• Retry logic on failed payments
• Chargeback handling

Webhook events from GoCardless update payment status in real time.

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Fees

GoCardless fees depend on your GoCardless plan. Aestheticc does not mark up GoCardless fees — you pay GoCardless directly. The Aestheticc platform fee on Direct Debit payments is approximately 0.75%.

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Related Guides

• Payments Overview
• Payment Links
• Refunds

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Need help? support@aestheti.cc