Mass payouts send money to many recipients at once from a single register rather than one transfer at a time. Marketplaces, partner programmes and companies working with contractors use them: the money flows out of the company, not into it.
Who needs them
- Marketplaces and platforms — settling with sellers after deals.
- Companies with contractors — paying freelancers and suppliers.
- Partner programmes — paying rewards to members.
- Services issuing compensation — bulk refunds and customer bonuses.
How they differ from refunds
A refund is tied to a specific customer payment: money goes back to whoever paid, up to the amount they paid. A payout is a standalone operation in favour of a recipient, unrelated to anything they paid you.
Hence the difference at onboarding: accepting payments and sending payouts are separate scenarios, with separately agreed terms.
What to watch when automating
- Recipient identifiers. You need a reliable way to tie a register row to a person or seller in your system.
- Statuses. A payout is not instant: your handler must accept the status later.
- Retries. Protection against sending the same payout twice is mandatory.
- Reconciliation. The register you sent and the register that executed must match.
See mass payouts; the programmatic flow is covered by the payment API.
