# Capitec Pay Variable Recurring Payments

> Recurring payments on Capitec accounts, the one method available today.

Source: https://hub.ozow.com/payment-methods/recurring-payments/capitec-pay-vrp/

> ⚠️ **Limited availability, and by approval only.** Capitec Pay Variable Recurring Payments are
> available to merchants Ozow has approved for a specific use case. Not all use cases are
> authorised. Speak to your account manager before planning around them.

Capitec Pay Variable Recurring Payments are the one way to take recurring payments through Ozow
today. Your customer approves a single agreement in their Capitec app, and you collect against it
afterwards without sending them back.

For what recurring payments are, how the agreement and the collections fit together, and what to
expect of any method, start at [Recurring payments](https://hub.ozow.com/payment-methods/recurring-payments.md). This page is what's
specific to Capitec.

## Who can use it

Your customer must bank with Capitec and have the Capitec app. There is no fallback within the
method: a customer who banks elsewhere needs a standard payment each cycle, so build that path
alongside this one.

| | |
|---|---|
| Bank | Capitec |
| Customer identifier | Their Capitec-linked cell phone number |
| Approval | In the Capitec app |
| API | One API. Not available on the older Payments API |
| Checkout | Redirect only. Embedded integration isn't supported for the agreement step |

## How your customer sets up the agreement

1. You send the customer to Ozow.
2. They enter their Capitec-linked cell phone number.
3. They approve the consent request in their Capitec app.
4. Capitec notifies Ozow and the agreement becomes active.

Once it's active, each collection is yours to trigger and your customer does nothing.

## Things to know

**Your customer has three minutes to approve.** Capitec allows three minutes for the consent
request to be approved in the app. If they don't approve within that window the request lapses, the
subscription becomes `Expired`, and you must create a new one and send them through again. Three
minutes is short enough that it's worth telling them what's coming before you redirect.

**A cancellation reaches Capitec.** Cancelling through Ozow cancels the agreement on Capitec's side
too, so it takes effect for the customer rather than only in your records. Your customer can
equally cancel it in their own app without telling you, and the first you know of it is a failed
collection.

**Collections are capped by count as well as by amount.** An agreement carries a cadence and a
total number of collections, not an open-ended licence. An agreement that runs to its limit ends,
and continuing to bill that customer means a new agreement.

**Card is not available yet.** Capitec is the only method the recurring endpoints support today.
Say so explicitly in your integration rather than leaving the choice to a default, or your customer
sees a payment method selection screen with one option on it.

## Integrating Capitec Pay Variable Recurring Payments

The guide covers creating the agreement, the redirect, collecting against it, the subscription and
collection webhooks, and cancelling.

→ [Set up recurring payments](https://hub.ozow.com/integration-methods/apis/recurring-payments/set-up-recurring-payments.md)

**Status handling**: see [Transaction and settlement statuses](https://hub.ozow.com/integration-methods/statuses.md).