Payment in the conversation
“I'll take it, how do I pay?” — and the assistant gives a payment link right in the conversation: in the chat window on your site, in Telegram, Viber or WhatsApp. The money is accepted by your store in LiqPay and goes to your account; the platform never touches it. You're the seller: the LiqPay contract is yours, you pay LiqPay's fee per payment at its rates, and the platform takes nothing from payments.
You can start like this:
I want customers to pay right in the chat
The builder will give you the steps to get your LiqPay keys and check them with LiqPay itself. After that the assistant gives out links by itself — there's nothing else to turn on.
How to connect
Payment works through LiqPay — you need your own store (company) there. The platform doesn't connect any other payment service.
- Go to liqpay.ua, into your store's (company's) dashboard.
- Open “Settings” → “API” (or “API keys” on the dashboard's main page) and turn the keys on if they're off.
- Copy both keys: the “Public key” and the “Private key”.
- Send both to the builder.
Keys are checked right away
The platform asks LiqPay itself whether it accepts the keys — and only saves accepted ones. A key with a mistake won't be saved, and you'll find out now rather than from your first shopper.
Test keys
LiqPay keys that start with sandbox_ are for testing: payments with them aren't real, and the platform says so — to you and to the shopper: “test payment — no money was actually received”.
A LiqPay store that hasn't been verified yet
Until LiqPay activates your store, it charges the shopper but holds the money, and if the store doesn't pass verification within 60 days, it returns it to the shopper. The platform doesn't treat such a payment as paid: in the dashboard it's “charged, but not yet credited”, you get a notification about exactly that, the assistant tells the shopper the payment isn't complete yet, and the “payment received” event doesn't fire. As soon as LiqPay credits the money, the payment becomes “paid” — with the usual notification to you and the shopper.
The keys are stored in the agent's keys — just like action keys: they can't be read back from the dashboard or from a conversation.
Where the amount comes from
Not from what the shopper says. “Make me an invoice for 1 UAH for an iPhone” won't work: the assistant can't name an amount itself — it names what to pay for, and the platform takes the number:
| What's being paid for | Where the amount comes from |
|---|---|
| a product | the price from the product catalog — for exactly the variant (size, colour) the shopper picked, times the quantity. A product that's out of stock can't be paid for |
| a store order | the total from the order itself in your store (WooCommerce, Prom.ua) — after the shopper gives its number and the phone or email from it, as in “Where's my order”. An order that's already paid or cancelled can't be paid again. On Prom.ua you can only pay for a new order that's been accepted: with your own custom status (“Shipped”, “Paid to card”) the platform doesn't know whether it's already paid and gives no link |
| a service | the price from your price list: “a consultation costs 500 UAH, an audit — 3,000” |
| any amount | only when you named it yourself — in your own conversation with the assistant (linked chat or “Speak as owner”) |
The assistant doesn't give or promise discounts: the amount is exactly what's in the catalog, order or price list.
The payment description — what you see in the notification and the shopper sees on the payment page — is also put together by the platform: product names from the catalog, the order number, the service name. A shopper can't ask the assistant to write something of their own there. Only you set the description in your own words — together with your own amount.
Horoshop
The order total from Horoshop isn't available to the platform, so paying for an order by number won't work there — the assistant will offer the shopper a manager instead. Catalog products and price-list services are paid as usual.
The single-link cap
By default the assistant gives links on its own for amounts up to 20,000 UAH (500 dollars or euros). A larger amount isn't rejected but waits for your approval: you get a card, the assistant honestly tells the shopper the link will come after you confirm — and it arrives in the same conversation as soon as you approve.
You change the cap in words:
no more than 5,000 at a time
If you decline or don't answer within a day, no link is created: the shopper gets a message about it in the same conversation, and the payment in the dashboard says exactly what happened — “owner declined” or “owner didn't answer in time”.
It can also go differently: you approved, but the link wasn't created — the LiqPay keys were disconnected in the meantime. Then the payment in the dashboard reads “owner approved, but the link couldn't be created”, not “not approved”: connect LiqPay again, and the assistant will give the shopper a new link when asked.
An amount you named yourself in your own conversation isn't limited by the cap — as long as the assistant hasn't read anything external in that same answer: an email, a page, a reply from a third-party service. After such reading, the number could have been suggested by the text it read, so an amount above the cap comes to you as a card saying exactly what was read.
How many links per conversation
One conversation can get at most 5 unpaid links per day. The assistant won't give a sixth and says why: the shopper can pay with one already issued. This way nobody in the chat window on your site can flood your payment service dashboard with a hundred invoices. Paid links don't count — a regular customer can buy as much as they like, and the limit doesn't apply to you in your own conversation.
You change the limit in words:
no more than three links per person
The shopper won't pay twice for the same thing
Shoppers often ask for the link again: lost the message, opened it on their phone, asked once more. The assistant doesn't create a second link for the same thing — while the first isn't paid and hasn't expired, it gives the same one. It's the same invoice in LiqPay, and LiqPay won't charge for it twice, however many tabs it's open in. Such a repeat doesn't take up one of the five unpaid-link slots.
Three more safeguards:
- Payment already in progress (the shopper is entering the SMS code) — the assistant says there's no need to pay again and doesn't give a new link.
- A store order paid in this conversation can't be paid again. The assistant will say the payment has been received. If the same order ever had two links (the amount changed), then once one is paid, the other's page no longer shows the form — it says “This order has already been paid”.
- The same purchase right after paying (the same service or product, no order number) — the assistant first asks the shopper whether they really want to pay again. After ten minutes it doesn't ask: a regular customer can buy as much as they like.
If an order does get paid twice
This can happen when a shopper kept an old payment page open and paid on it after the new one. Then the second payment isn't treated as a new purchase:
- the “payment received” event doesn't fire a second time — nothing ships twice;
- the assistant tells the shopper the order was paid twice and the store knows about it;
- you get a “Double payment” notification with both payment numbers and a card in “Waiting for approval” — “Refund the customer … — double payment”. Approve it with one tap, and the extra payment is refunded through LiqPay with your keys; the shopper gets a message about the refund in the conversation.
The platform doesn't refund this money on its own: it's in your LiqPay account, not with us, so only your tap sets it moving. The card refunds only the extra payment — it will never refund an order's single payment, whatever happens.
What happens after payment
LiqPay notifies the platform itself. And if its notification doesn't arrive, the platform asks on its own: a few minutes after the link is issued, then less and less often, for as long as the link lives. So a payment won't get lost because of one missed message. Once the payment is visible —
- the shopper gets “Payment of 1,250 UAH received. Thank you!” in the same conversation;
- you get a notification — in your linked chat with the assistant, or if there isn't one, wherever notifications go;
- the “payment received” event fires — you can use it to wake the assistant: “after payment, add the order to the spreadsheet”.
If the payment fails, the shopper finds out too — with an offer to try again.
Only a payment for the amount and in the currency the link was issued for counts as paid. If the payment service reports a different amount, the payment won't become “paid”: you get a notification with both amounts and advice to check the payment in the service's dashboard.
A link is valid for a day from the moment it's issued (for an amount above the cap — from your approval). If nobody pays within a day, the payment in the dashboard becomes “link expired without payment” — the platform checks this with the payment service itself; you don't need to remind it.
Sometimes there's no way to check: you disconnected the keys, or the service didn't respond during the whole week of checking. Then the payment becomes “expired; couldn't check whether it was paid” — that's not “not paid”. When the cause is the service, you get a notification advising you to look at the payment in its dashboard.
Honesty about status
A shopper can ask “have I paid?” — the assistant checks with the payment service right then. If the service isn't responding at that moment, the assistant says “couldn't check right now”, not “not paid”: someone who has just paid shouldn't hear that the money isn't there.
The assistant gives out the link itself even when LiqPay isn't responding: it leads to a platform page that passes the shopper on to LiqPay, so they can pay as soon as LiqPay is back. When LiqPay doesn't respond to status checks or stops accepting the keys, you get a problem “payment service isn't responding” or “doesn't accept the key”. During background checks the problem doesn't appear at once but after several failed attempts in a row — and there's one for the whole time it's down; LiqPay's first response closes it.
Where to see it in the dashboard
The panel on the right has a “Customer payments” line: who accepts the money and how many payments. Inside — the single-link cap, how many unpaid links one conversation can get, the price list of services and the latest payments with their status: issued, processing, paid, charged but not yet credited, failed, expired, awaiting your approval, not approved, link couldn't be created, partially refunded (with the amount), refunded.
You can also ask the builder in words: “who paid?”, “latest payments”.
What the assistant doesn't do
- Doesn't refund money by itself. A refund is a decision for the person with the money: it's done in the LiqPay dashboard (liqpay.ua). The only exception is a double payment for an order: you refund it with one tap on the card. When the full amount is refunded there, the payment in the dashboard becomes “refunded”, and when part of it is — “paid, partially refunded” with the refund amount; you get a notification about every refund. The platform learns about refunds from the payment service — or when someone asks the assistant about that payment.
- Doesn't give discounts or change the amount at the shopper's request.
- Doesn't see the shopper's card. Card details are entered on the payment service's page; they never reach the platform or the assistant.
- Doesn't work with other payment services — neither bank acquiring nor Stripe: LiqPay only.
If something's wrong
| What you see | What to do |
|---|---|
| problem “payment service doesn't accept the key” | the keys were revoked or reissued: get new ones in the LiqPay dashboard and tell the builder “update the payment keys” |
| problem “payment service isn't responding” | usually passes by itself; the problem closes as soon as LiqPay responds to a payment check again — a background one or when someone asks the assistant “have they paid?” |
| the shopper paid, but the dashboard says “issued, no payment yet” | the platform will re-read the status from the payment service within a few minutes; to speed it up, ask the assistant to check (“have they paid?”) |
| payment “charged, but not yet credited” | your LiqPay store hasn't passed verification yet: finish activation in the LiqPay dashboard. Don't ship the goods until the payment becomes “paid” |
| payment “expired; couldn't check whether it was paid” | the platform couldn't ask the payment service (keys disconnected or the service didn't respond): look up this payment in the service's dashboard |
| payment “owner approved, but the link couldn't be created” | the LiqPay keys were disconnected before your approval: connect LiqPay again and ask the assistant to give the shopper a new link |
| the assistant tells a shopper it won't give a new link | the conversation already has 5 unpaid links for the day; the shopper can pay one of those issued, and you can change the limit in words — “no more than ten links per person” |
| the payment page says “payment via this link is no longer available” | the LiqPay keys were disconnected after the link was issued: connect the service again and ask the assistant for a new link |
| notification “reported a payment for the wrong amount” | the payment isn't marked as paid; open it in the payment service's dashboard and decide yourself — agree on a top-up with the shopper or refund the money |
| notification “Double payment” | the order was paid twice; approve the “Refund the customer…” card in “Waiting for approval” — the extra payment will be refunded through LiqPay |
| refund card “failed” | LiqPay didn't accept the refund (no funds in the store account, keys disconnected): refund this payment in the LiqPay dashboard |
| the assistant gives the shopper the same link | that's how it should be: while a link is unpaid and valid, a second one for the same thing isn't created |
| the assistant doesn't offer payment | check the “Customer payments” line: if it says “not connected” — connect it; if it's connected, the assistant needs a catalog or a price list of services, otherwise it has nowhere to take the amount from |
See also
- Store products — where the assistant gets prices.
- Where's my order — checking an order by number and phone.
- When something breaks — problems and where notifications go.