Billing Requirement 1.2 — separating App Store installs (Shopify Pricing) from preexisting SaaS customers (Stripe)

Shopify App Store
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1

We’re building a Shopify app for Syncway.io, a standalone integration hub that connects various systems together (Shopify being one of several supported integrations). I want to confirm our billing architecture is compliant with Requirement 1.2 before we submit for review.

We’re splitting customers into two sources:

Shopify-sourced — merchants who install our app through the Shopify App Store. They are always billed through Shopify Pricing, including charges for non-Shopify integrations, to keep billing homogeneous.

Native-sourced — customers who sign up directly on our website, many of whom have no connection to Shopify at all. They are billed through Stripe. If they later add the Shopify integration, they stay on Stripe (following prior guidance that preexisting non-App-Store customers aren’t required to move to Shopify Billing).

The edge case we want to confirm: a Native-sourced customer who later installs our app via the App Store. We handle this at install time — the merchant either logs into their existing (Stripe-billed) account, in which case they remain on Stripe, or creates a new account, which is Shopify-billed. So the billing source is determined by whether an App Store install maps to a preexisting account or a fresh one.

Is this interpretation acceptable, i.e. is it compliant to keep a preexisting Stripe customer on Stripe even when they link their store through an App Store install, as long as new App Store accounts always go through Shopify Pricing? We want to be as compliant and generous as possible here and would appreciate a pre-assessment before submission.

For reference, this follows the discussion here: Billing requirement 1.2 — free connector app for a standalone (non-Shopify-exclusive) SaaS with external subscription

2

Yes, it is acceptable, but you will need approval to charge merchants outside of the Shopify Billing API.

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3

Thank you so much, for your reply and for your time.

4

Hi Remy!

Thank you so much for your answer!

Is there any other way to get this approval before we re-submit the review so we can tick this by the time we do so, or the only way to get it is to post the exemption request (similar to my message above) to the testing instructions?

Could you guide me where could we acquire this? I have contacted support and wrote a post here, as instructed previously.

5

Hey @Ladam0203Grumsen you do not need to request permission in this case, however your app can fail review if it’s possible for a shopify merchant to install your app in the app store and reach your stripe billing flow. You will need to keep your non-shopify merchant billing logic completely separate so merchants won’t accidentally choose that, or worse, both!