Should Beeminder collect payment info without redirecting to a Stripe page?
14
177
290
2025
19%
chance

Background: https://blog.beeminder.com/stripe/

See the before/after screenshots.

When we upgraded to the new version of Stripe Checkout, it was easiest for us to redirect to a Stripe page to collect payment info when a user signs up for Beeminder. But we got this bit of feedback / prediction from a user:

The Stripe page you hit after pressing "add your payment method" is terrifying. It's unclear you're even still on Beeminder. And no clues at all about what will be done with your credit card after entering the details.

If that's correct, then we probably want to take the time to (using a thing called Stripe Elements) make the payment info be part of the Beeminder signup page, either directly inline or with a popup like it was before.

This market resolves YES if we do that and it makes enough difference to have been worth the effort. If we do that and it doesn't make much difference (or makes it worse) then it resolves NO. If we don't try it, it resolves N/A.

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bought Ṁ20 of NO

I prefer seeing a real stripe page, because I trust Stripe more than most people to accept my CC info. Really, I predict "N/A" as the most likely outcome, but if this is tried I don't expect it to help.

predicts NO

Update: We added some explanatory text which seems to be helping a lot:

predicts NO

Counterpoint from another user:

I think it's better to redirect to the Stripe website. That makes it clear that you are using Stripe, which is internationally-known as a secure payment method.

Having a Stripe form on your own website doesn't make that clear. You might be implementing some dodgy credit card saving mechanism of your own and just adding Stripe branding to make it look legit.

The "terrifying" feedback is startling. "It's unclear you're even still on Beeminder" -- well, you aren't, and that's a GOOD thing. It does have some Beeminder branding, so it's pretty obvious that the details you're entering will be used for Beeminder (and, yes, possibly for other, undesirable things too but my next point covers that).

The person who made that feedback probably doesn't know what Stripe is or how it's used (which isn't their fault, they've never known a need for that info before -- [turns out they do and were giving that feedback from the perspective of a more naive user, but the points all stand]). Maybe this would be helped if the page that redirects to Stripe explains that you're using Stripe, and that Stripe stores credit card details securely, and won't send them to any other site, and in fact won't even show the details to Beeminder itself [true!] so it's not possible for the card number to be leaked from Beeminder's servers.