Short answer: treat each payment gateway as one more bank account and each payout as a transfer from that account to your bank. Record gross sales, fees, refunds and disputes inside the gateway; in the bank, you only match the net deposit. That way every euro that lands is explained and you never count the same sales twice.
If you sell online, run a SaaS or take card payments at a restaurant, you have seen it: you sell €10,000 and €9,000 reaches the bank days later, in a single line with no detail. Here is why it happens, how each gateway settles, how to reconcile it by hand and how Orama does it.
What a payout is and why your bank doesn’t match your sales
A payout (also called a settlement or transfer) is the net amount a gateway sends to your bank for a period. It is not a sale: it is many sales minus everything the gateway deducts before paying you, so it rarely matches what your store or ERP shows.
These are the five reasons for the gap:
- Fees. The gateway charges for processing each payment and often deducts it straight from the payout. This is the classic “why does Stripe pay me less?”.
- Refunds. When you refund an order, the gateway takes it out of the next payout, even if the original sale was weeks ago.
- Disputes or chargebacks. When a customer complains to their bank, the gateway holds the amount (sometimes plus a fee) until it is resolved.
- Reserves or holds. Some gateways keep part of your balance as a guarantee, especially for new accounts or higher-risk sectors. That money is yours, but it isn’t in your bank yet.
- Settlement schedule. Money from a sale doesn’t arrive at once: it is first “pending”, then “available”, and then paid out on a schedule (daily, weekly, monthly or manual). One payout can bundle several days of sales, and one day’s sales can be split across two payouts.
Example: an online cosmetics store with €3M in annual revenue sells €10,000 in a week through Stripe. It pays €250 in fees, refunds €600 of orders and has a €150 dispute open. The payout that reaches the bank is €9,000. If the owner only looks at the bank, they think they sold €9,000 and never see the €250 it cost to get paid.
How each gateway settles, in general
Every gateway works differently, and terms depend on your contract, country and history. This table summarizes how each one works in general according to its public documentation; always check your own account terms.
| Gateway | Who pays you | When the money arrives | What is deducted | Where to see the detail |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Stripe | Stripe, from your available balance | On the schedule you choose: automatic (daily, weekly or monthly) or manual. The first payout takes longer than the rest. | Fees, refunds and disputes. If refunds exceed sales, the balance can go negative and Stripe may debit your bank account. | Stripe Dashboard: balances, payouts and payout reconciliation reports. |
| PayPal | Money stays in your PayPal balance until you transfer it to your bank | When you withdraw; the transfer takes a few business days and may be reviewed. | The fee is deducted from each payment. Withdrawing from a balance in another currency involves a conversion. | PayPal account activity and reports. |
| Redsys (Spanish card terminals and virtual POS) | Your bank: Redsys is the banks’ processing platform and doesn’t pay you directly | According to your POS contract with the bank. | Depends on the contract: fees may be netted from the deposit or charged separately. | Your bank statement and the POS transaction lookup. |
| Adyen | Adyen, in net batches | After a settlement delay and at the configured frequency; no payouts on weekends or bank holidays. | Transaction costs, refunds, chargebacks and other adjustments, added to the batch in which they happen. | Adyen Customer Area and the settlement details report for each batch. |
What they have in common: none of them pays you sale by sale. They all bundle, deduct and settle with a delay, which is why you can’t reconcile by looking at the bank alone.
How to reconcile payouts by hand, step by step
- Download the payout report. In the gateway dashboard, export the breakdown of each payout: which payments, fees, refunds and disputes make it up.
- Find the deposit in the bank. Look for the line with the same net amount and a nearby date. It usually carries the gateway’s name in the description.
- Check the math. Gross sales − fees − refunds − disputes − reserves = payout. If it doesn’t add up, look for adjustments from other periods or a negative balance carried over.
- Record sales at gross. Book sales to their category (for example, “Online sales”) at the full amount, not the bank’s net figure.
- Record fees separately. Create an expense category called “Gateway fees”. You’ll know what it costs you to get paid, and accounting gets the right figure.
- Record refunds and disputes. Each in its own category, dated when the gateway deducted them.
- Mark the payout as a transfer. The bank deposit isn’t new income: it is money moving from the gateway to your account. Booking it as income doubles your sales.
- Track the pending balance. Note what is still in the gateway (pending, reserved or disputed). It is your cash, just not in the bank yet.
With a few sales, a spreadsheet will do. With thousands of orders, manual matching is slow and error-prone.
How it affects your cash flow forecast
If you don’t separate sales, fees and the settlement schedule, your cash flow forecast goes wrong in three places:
- When the money arrives. Selling today isn’t getting paid today. Days pass between the sale and the bank deposit, more so around sales, campaigns and holidays. For the coming weeks’ cash, the payout date matters, not the sale date.
- How much arrives. Forecast with gross sales and you overestimate cash. Forecast with the bank’s net figure and you can’t see the cost of getting paid, or whether one gateway is cheaper than another.
- What is held back. Reserves and disputes are money that may arrive late or never. Keep it separate and don’t count on it for payroll or suppliers.
For short-term planning, the 13-week cash flow template helps you order receipts by the real deposit date.
How Orama does it
In Orama, Stripe, PayPal, Redsys and Adyen are connected from Banks, just like another bank account. Here is how it works:
- Read-only connection. You authorize access in the gateway and Orama downloads payments, fees, refunds and payouts, up to 4 times a day, just like your banks. Orama can’t move money or issue refunds.
- Redsys, transaction by transaction. Orama connects to the Redsys platform, so you see the breakdown of every card terminal transaction, not just the bank’s bundled deposit.
- Every payout broken down. Each bank deposit is explained by the payments and fees inside it, instead of being a lone line.
- Categories and rules. You create at least online sales, gateway fees and refunds. With each category’s keywords, transactions reconcile automatically.
- Payout as a transfer. The payout leaves the gateway and enters the bank as a transfer between accounts, so it isn’t counted as new income.
- Disputes with their own label. When a customer disputes a payment, the transaction arrives with its own description (in Stripe, for example, «dispute fee»). You create a rule once and choose which category it goes to. They are rare, but this way none slips through.
- Pending balance in view. You see what the gateway is still holding and factor it into your cash forecast for the coming days.
Orama connects to 100% of banks in Spain and 3,000+ across Europe and Latin America, updated up to 4 times a day. Everything sits in the same automatic reconciliation and the same forecast. See the details on the payment gateway reconciliation page.
Orama Academy (in Spanish): step-by-step guide to connecting your gateway, creating categories and reconciling payouts in Gateway payouts.
Want to see it with your own data? Try Orama free for 7 days, no card required, or book a 30-minute demo. Check the plans at orama.ai/planes.
Frequently asked questions
Why does Stripe pay me less than I sold?
Because the payout is net: Stripe deducts fees, refunds and disputes before transferring, and it bundles sales from different days according to your schedule. The difference isn’t lost money: it is costs and adjustments you need to record separately.
What is the Stripe payout schedule?
It is how often Stripe transfers your available balance: automatically (daily, weekly or monthly) or manually. Changing the schedule doesn’t shorten the time a sale takes to move from pending to available.
How do I reconcile a Redsys card terminal?
The deposit doesn’t come from Redsys but from the bank that provides your POS. By hand, compare the day’s transactions with the deposit in your account and check your contract to see whether fees are netted from the deposit or charged separately. In Orama you don’t need to: it connects to the Redsys platform and brings in the breakdown of every card terminal transaction.
How do I record PayPal fees in my accounts?
As a separate expense, not by netting them from sales. Record the sale at gross, the fee in its expense category and the PayPal withdrawal to your bank as a transfer between accounts.
Does Orama work with other gateways?
Orama connects Stripe, PayPal, Redsys and Adyen. If you use another one, you can import its settlements from Excel as if they were a batch of direct debits, so the total settlement is split into its payments and fees.
