Getting status on canceled/expired credit cards for recurring billing with authorize.net

Question

We're setting up a system that will use the XML API for Automated Recurring Billing with Authorize.net.

It looks simple enough to set up a recurring billing. But we have two features that do not seem obvious * providing customers with details on individual payments * providing notification to customers of expired/canceled cards

Anyone familiar with a mechanism to retrieve this info in automated form? We're considering * just listing out assumed payments based on our own calculations the start date * emailing customers based on the expiration date of the ards

But I'm stymed on how to figure out when a transaction failed due to canceled card (and automatically notify the customer).

Can anyone comment on how they handled this issue when implementing a subscription-based service based on Authorize.net?

Answer 1

You want to use Authorize.Net's silent post feature. It will notify you of all payments made through their system including declines and expired credit cards. Your script will then be able to suspend accounts and/or notify your customers that their payments has failed.

See these link for more info:

Handling Authorize.Net ARB Subscription Failures

All About Authorize.Net’s Silent Post

Handling Authorize.Net Silent Post with PHP

Answer 2

Authorize.Net has recently published a new ARB method "ARBGetSubscriptionStatus".

You may now easily query the status of a previously submitted ARB subscription without the need to depend on the "Silent Post Method".

Example:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> <ARBGetSubscriptionStatusRequest xmlns="AnetApi/xml/v1/schema/AnetApiSchema.xsd"> <merchantAuthentication> <name>mytestacct</name> <transactionKey>112223344</transactionKey> </merchantAuthentication> <refId>Sample</refId> <subscriptionId>100748</subscriptionId> </ARBGetSubscriptionStatusRequest>