Accept installment card payments in Japan

Installments (分割払い) are a type of credit card payment in Japan that allows customers to split purchases over multiple billing statements. You receive the full amount as with standard card payments, and the customer’s card company provides credit and collects the funds over time.

Stripe supports installment payments for Stripe Japan accounts using the Payment Intents and Payment Methods APIs.

Get started with accepting installments.

Fees

Accepting installments doesn’t result in any additional fees for you. However, your customer might pay interest to their credit card company. Interest typically doesn’t apply when paying in two installments or with bonus installment plans, but does for others. Cardholders can check with their card company to learn about their fees.

Transaction availability timing

Payments using installments become available on the same schedule as other card payments.

User experience

In a Stripe-hosted payment UI, the option to pay in installments only displays after a user enters a supported card number. Use a test card number to test the functionality in the Checkout Demo. If you’ve built a custom payment UI using the direct API, we recommend you similarly collect the card number first, then display any available installment plans.

Requirements

There are restrictions on which transactions and cards can use installments. Stripe automatically determines installments eligibility after you set up the payment method.

• Stripe only supports installments for Japanese Stripe accounts.
• The payment method must be a credit card issued in Japan. Debit and prepaid cards are not supported.
• The currency must be JPY.
• Don’t use installments for recurring payments or other off-session payments where your customer doesn’t select the installment plan when making the payment.

In addition, different brands offer different combinations of plans.

Bonus payments

Bonus payments are available during two annual cycles:

• Summer: Dec 16 to Jun 15
• Winter: Jul 16 to Nov 15

On days between these cycles, bonus payments are unavailable:

• Jun 16 to Jul 15
• Nov 16 to Dec 15

When bonus payments are unavailable:

• Stripe doesn’t include bonus payments as an available plan.
• You can’t create payments with bonus plans. If you try to do so, the Payment Intent confirmation fails with a payment_intent_invalid_parameter error.

If your customer is in your checkout while bonus payments are still available (for example, 11.59pm on Jun 15), but attempts to complete the payment when they’re no longer available (for example, 12:01am on Jun 16), their payment fails.

If you use separate authorization and capture to create a bonus payment and capture it at a later date when bonus payments are unavailable, your customers might see their bonus payment as a normal card payment, or in their next bonus cycle.