Alipay, China's leading third-party online payment solutionAlipay, China's leading third-party online payment solution

Settlement and reconciliation

Alipay provides financial reports to help you streamline your business workflows. You can download and use reports to perform financial tasks, such as validating funds received and reconciling balances.

Settlement modes

If multiple wallets are supported in your system for payment service, two settlement modes exist:

  • Settlement for single wallet: settlement for each Alipay+ Mobile Payment Partner (Alipay+ MPP) wallet is conducted individually
  • Settlement for multiple wallets: combined settlement of all Alipay+ MPP wallets

Note: For the multiple wallets settlement mode, all wallets must be settled together, without the option of choosing certain wallets to settle together.

For reconciliation, three types of reports are provided to the merchant: Settlement Summary, Settlement Items, and Transaction Items. The file name for a specific type of report differs for each settlement mode. If you select the multiple wallets settlement mode when signing the contract, the Settlement Summary and Settlement Items files will be created based on the settlement mode of multiple wallets settlement, even if only one Alipay+ MPP wallet is involved for the settlement.

More details about the reports are illustrated in the Reports section.

Settlement schedule

Alipay performs a merchant settlement at the end of each settlement period, which brings merchants into balance. This process occurs at the end of each settlement cycle, or occurs when the settlement amount reaches some pre-defined level of imbalance (trigger-point).

图片1.png

Figure 1. Settlement schedule

Notes:

  • Time zone: cross-border settlement GMT+8 local settlement time
  • If remittance fails due to insufficient fund, there will be no settlement files.

Currently, the cut-off time is 23:59:59 Beijing TZ (GMT+8), and the standard settlement cycle for the transactions is one business day, known as T+1. However, for transactions completed on Friday, weekend, and certain holidays, more time is required for settlement. For the exact settlement period, refer to your contract with Alipay for details.

Reports

This section provides information about how to get reports and details about each type of report.

Obtaining reports

You can fetch reconciliation reports to view details of transactions. Alipay uploads reports to a specific directory in the SFTP for being downloaded, and all reports are UTF-8 encoded. To obtain your reports through SFTP, complete the following steps.

  1. Contact Alipay Technical support (overseas_support@service.alibaba.com) to obtain the SFTP login credentials and submit your public IP address through which you visit the SFTP server.
  2. Log in to SFTP server to download reports. Use the following settings to log in and obtain files:
    • Port: 22
    • Host name: isftp.alipay.com
    • Username and password

Notes:

  • SFTP accounts that are not used for 90 days will be disabled.
  • Files older than seven days on the SFTP server might be removed. It is suggested to download the files within three days. If the file you need is deleted, contact Alipay Technical Support for help.
  • Use the standard host name "isftp.alipay.com" of Alipay SFTP server rather than a fixed IP address to log in your Alipay SFTP account. Alipay disables IP address 198.11.150.** on February, 18 2022. You will not be able to log in and download Alipay reconciliation reports if you use this fixed IP address. If you have more questions or requirements, please contact Alipay Technical support (overseas_support@service.alibaba.com).

Report types

The following table shows the reports provided by Alipay and tasks that can be performed by the corresponding reports.

Report

Task

Settlement

Summary

  • View the summary of all clearing data in each clearing cycle 
  • Identify discrepancies between summary report and detail report 

Settlement Items

  • View transaction details within the settlement period
  • Perform reconciliation and funds settlement

Transaction Items

  • View transaction details of the corresponding T day, including records of transactions and refunds.
  • Validate funds received and refunded

Table 1. Reports and tasks

About the commission fee:

  • In the sandbox environment, the commission fee is a fixed value of 10 and is in the currency's smallest unit. For example, for a transaction in USD, the commission fee is 10 cents.
  • In the production environment, the commission fee is calculated based on the real merchant discount rate (MDR).

Settlement Summary report

The Settlement Summary report provides summary information, such as the total number of transactions in a period of time and the amount for settlement, for clearing data between you and Alipay. For every clearing cycle, a settlement summary report is created.

The Settlement Summary report consists of two parts:

  • Settlement summary
  • The file end indicator <END> that appears in the last line of the file.

File directory:

/v1/settlements/<customerId>/<settlementDate>/

File name:

  • Settlement for a single wallet:

settlementSummary_<pspName>_<settlementCurrency>_<settlementBatchId>_<seq>.csv

  • Settlement for multiple wallets:

settlementSummary_<settlementCurrency>_<settlementBatchId>_<seq>.csv

where,

  • pspName is the name of Alipay+ Mobile Payment Partner.
  • settlementCurrency is the agreed settlement currency, which is the same as the expense settlement currency in the file content.
  • settlementBatchId is the settlement batch code corresponds to the settlement batch number in the Summary Files.
  • seq is the document serial number. When there are multiple expense details in the same clearing cycle, each detail file will be increased from 000 as needed, up to 999.

Settlement Items report

The Settlement Items report provides settlement details in a settlement cycle. This file is provided in a document form and is generated along with the summary file of the settlement cycle.

The Settlement Items report consists of two parts:

  • Settlement details
  • The file end indicator <END> that appears in the last line of the file.

File directory:

/v1/settlements/<customerId>/<settlementDate>/

File name:

  • Settlement for a single wallet:

settlementItems_<pspName>_<settlementCurrency>_<settlementBatchId>_<seq>.csv

  • Settlement for multiple wallets:

settlementItems_<settlementCurrency>_<settlementBatchId>_<seq>.csv

where,

  • pspName is the name of Alipay+ Mobile Payment Partner.
  • settlementCurrency is the agreed settlement currency, which is the same as the expense settlement currency in the file content.
  • settlementBatchId is the settlement batch code corresponds to the settlement batch number in the Summary Files.
  • seq is the document serial number. When there are multiple expense details in the same clearing cycle, each detail file will be increased from 000 as needed, up to 999.

Transaction Items report

The Transaction Items report provides all successful transaction details on T day, and is generated on the T+1 day.

The transaction detail report consists of two parts:

  • Transaction details, for example, transaction data details.
  • The file end indicator <END> that appears in the last line of the file.

File directory: /v1/settlements/<customerId>/<transactionDate>/

File name:

transactionItems_<transactionDate>_<seq>.csv

where,

  • transactionDate is the date of transaction.
  • seq is the file serial number. When there are multiple transaction details in the same transaction cycle, each detail file will be increased from 000 as needed, up to 999.

Exceptional cases

You might encounter problems when perform reconciliation. This section introduces how to identify and resolve exceptions as soon as possible.

Discrepancies exist

You might find discrepancies between different reports when perform reconciliation.

Why it happens

  • Errors occur when perform reconciliation
  • Problems happen when Alipay generates reports

How to fix it

  • When discrepancies exist,the report information from Alipay should prevail. You can review the reconciliation procedures first to figure out whether problems exist.
  • If adjustments are required, contact Alipay to review the related reports, and then take actions accordingly based on review results.

Unable to retrieve reports

You might be unable to view or retrieve the reports as usual.

Why it happens

  • The target report is damaged
  • Problems happen when Alipay generates reports

How to fix it

Contact Alipay to for help.

About fields

If you use any of the following fields in any transaction type, values of the following fields are expected to be consistent with those of the same fields in the original payment or authorization request:

  • referenceMerchantId
  • paymentMethodType
  • pspName
  • productCode

More information

User-presented mode payment introduction

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