This guide is for course providers who want customers to pay part of an order first and the remaining balance later. A deposit is a percentage of the order total after any discounts, promo code or gift card. The balance is the amount still to pay.
Deposits are available on Teams and Custom plans; see Understand Cademy Plans, Limits and Fees. You need the System Admin role to change the account’s payment settings and to work with orders. The order needs an available card or PayPal payment method. Customers cannot use Klarna, Invoice or a manual payment method to pay the deposit through checkout.
Set up deposits at checkout
In the Admin Dashboard, open Settings > Payments, then Deposits.
Turn on Offer Deposits at Checkout.
Set Default Deposit Rate to a whole number from 1 to 95.
Under Balance Due, enter a number of days and choose Days Before the Course Starts or Days After the Order Is Placed.
Optionally enter a Customer Message to explain your payment terms at checkout.
Select Save. Check that the settings were saved successfully.
Set a course-specific rate
First turn on and save Offer Deposits at Checkout in your account settings. The course’s Deposits section is shown only while that account setting is on.
Open the course and select Edit Course.
Open Settings > Payments and find Deposits.
Under Deposits at Checkout, choose Use Account Default ([rate]% Deposit), Custom Rate for This Course or Don't Offer Deposits on This Course. For a custom rate, enter Deposit Rate (%) as a whole number from 1 to 95.
Select Save to save the course changes.
A course-specific rate does not replace the account’s balance-due rule or customer message. The account checkout switch must also be on for customers to see deposits at checkout.
When checkout offers a deposit
At the Payment step, an eligible customer can choose Pay in Full or Pay [rate]% Deposit. Monthly Payments may also appear if eligible, but one order cannot combine a deposit and an instalment plan.
Every course in a multi-course basket must allow deposits. If their rates differ, checkout uses the lowest rate.
The deposit and remaining balance must meet the minimum amounts for the currency.
The balance deadline must be at least 24 hours away. Otherwise checkout requires another available payment option.
For a deadline before course start, Cademy uses the earliest scheduled course in the order. If none of the courses has a date, it uses the configured number of days after the order date.
For example, a 20% deposit on a £120 final total is £24, leaving £96. The customer sees the actual amounts and balance deadline before paying.
Create an order with a deposit yourself
Start with Create an Order and Request Payment to add the customer, billing details and courses. Choose To be paid and select Send payment request.
Under Payment Plan, select Deposit.
Check or change Deposit Rate and Balance Due. Use a whole-number rate from 1 to 95 and a date of tomorrow or later.
Review the deposit and remaining balance, then select Create Order & Request Deposit.
Check the saved order and its invoice. Creating the request does not itself collect the deposit.
Admin-created orders do not have to pass the checkout opt-in rules for every course. The form prefills values from available settings, but you can change them. Your account still needs the deposit feature and a supported online payment method.
If a warning says the first-payment request was not created, the order has already been saved, but its payment email may link to the full invoice. Do not recreate it. Follow the first-payment warning steps in Create an Order and Request Payment to check the saved balance and share the correct custom-amount request.
Customer Credit cannot be applied at the same time as creating this payment plan. A later credit adjustment is not automatically equivalent to receiving the first payment. See Credit Notes and Customer Credit.
Check the deposit and collect the balance
In the Admin Dashboard, open Orders, select the order and expand Invoices & Payments. Check the deposit payment, the invoice’s remaining balance and its due date.
Cademy uses one invoice for the full order total. A successful deposit payment reduces that invoice’s outstanding balance; it does not create a separate deposit invoice. The invoice remains partially paid until its balance is settled.
Paying the deposit confirms an approved order. If a customer who has paid only the deposit tells you that online lessons do not open, contact Cademy Support and give the order number.
Emails about the deposit go to the Order Contact, the customer the order belongs to. For an order placed at checkout, the Order Contact receives the Deposit received email, and the Payment received email when the balance is paid. For an order you created yourself, Cademy does not send those two emails. The customer gets the payment request email instead: its subject starts “Payment required”, and it shows Deposit due now and Remaining balance due by, with a Pay Now button when automatic payment links are enabled and an online payment method is enabled.
When automatic payment links are enabled, the customer can pay the balance. After a checkout order, they can use Pay Balance on the confirmation page or in the Deposit received email. For any deposit order, they can open My Account > My Courses & Bookings > Orders & Billing, select the order and use Pay Invoice. Only the Order Contact can open the order in their account.
If you use Record Payment on the order, the customer’s order page no longer shows its INVOICES section, so Pay Invoice is not there. Cademy also does not send the Payment received email when the balance is paid later. To collect the rest online, send the customer a payment link yourself with Request Payment, as described below.
The customer can pay the remaining balance before its deadline. Cademy does not automatically charge their original card or PayPal account. Share the customer guide to paying a deposit and balance when they need help.
If automatic links are hidden, arrange payment with the customer. On the invoice in Invoices & Payments, select Request Payment to copy a link to share yourself. Copying the link does not send an email. See Request a Payment or Record Money Received Elsewhere.
If a customer cannot open the course page
While a deposit order is Partially Paid, the customer cannot open the course page or Manage Participants from the order in their account. A page headed No Booking Found (a course with a date) or No Order Found (a course without dates) opens instead and shows the email address they are logged in with. For a course without dates, the same page opens while the order is Overdue.
The order itself still opens from Orders & Billing. The Book Course or Order Course button on that page starts a new checkout for the course; it does not open the existing order. If a customer reports this, tell them not to book again. Contact Cademy Support with the order number if they need the course page before the balance is paid.
Balance reminders
Cademy’s daily checks look for eligible, partially paid deposit orders with a remaining balance seven days before the due date and on the due date. These are the Balance due soon and Balance due today reminders. They are sent for checkout orders and for orders you created yourself. A reminder date that has already passed is not a promise of a catch-up email.
Settled balances and cancelled orders are excluded from balance reminders. Automatic payment buttons depend on your invoice payment-link setting. Deposit overdue notifications are part of the deposit workflow: turning off Overdue Payments Reminder Emails for ordinary invoice payments does not switch them off.
Frequently asked questions
Can I switch deposits off without cancelling existing deposit orders?
Yes. Turning off Offer Deposits at Checkout changes future checkout availability. It does not erase an existing order’s deposit or balance.
Why is the deposit option missing?
Check your plan, account checkout switch, each course’s deposit settings, available payment methods, minimum amounts and the balance deadline. The Admin order form has different checkout-opt-in rules, as explained above.
Can the customer choose a different deposit percentage?
Not at checkout. They choose the percentage offered for that order or another available payment option. Staff can set the percentage while creating an Admin order.
Why is PayPal missing for some currencies?
PayPal is not available for orders in Malaysian ringgit (MYR) or South African rand (ZAR). Card payments can still be offered when enabled and supported for the order.
Does Xero receive a separate deposit invoice?
The deposit and balance belong to one invoice. Where invoice syncing is enabled, use that invoice to reconcile the payments rather than expecting a separate deposit invoice.