Overview
A charge plan groups the installments of one sale. The contracted total and the amount received are different: paying one installment does not settle the whole plan. Each installment keeps its own due date, payment and history.
Prerequisites
Enable Payments, connect a compatible gateway and check the payer details. Available options depend on the connection, method and cycle. Asaas offers native monthly boleto/Pix installments; other cycles use capped recurrence where supported. Boleto/Pix plans and capped recurrence only appear when that flow is released for the connection. A monthly credit card installment is a single charge the gateway splits, and it stays available even without billing plans. This release adds no direct integrations with new banks.
Step by step
- Open New charge in Payments or a conversation and select the customer, connection and method.
- Choose installments, enter the total, count, first due date and available cycle.
- Review the summary and terms before creating.
- Open the plan to track issued installments and progress.
- Use Download payment book to get the PDF and Send payment book in conversation to deliver it to the customer; check the recipient before sending.
- In each installment's menu, View charge is always available. Send this installment to the conversation only appears for open installments (pending, awaiting payment or overdue).
Settings & options
Native monthly installments are issued by the gateway. Capped recurrence has a final count but issues charges progressively: the projected schedule is not an issued boleto. A charge plan also differs from the reusable subscription template under Plans.
Under Payment terms, review connection defaults and override only what the charge needs. A blank field does not send an explicit override. Asaas account late-fee and interest settings cannot be read through its API; check the provider dashboard when needed.
In the plan details, configure installment-paid and plan-completed notices. By default, individual paid-installment notices are off and the completion notice is on. This choice applies to that plan; email and push delivery still depend on the user’s notification preferences. Enabling a notice does not replay events that have already occurred.
Use cases
Use monthly boleto for a sale in 12 installments. For a service billed quarterly with a defined end, use an available capped recurrence. An uncapped subscription remains recurring billing, without representing an installment sale with a finite total.
Tips, limits & best practices
The customer payment book is the platform PDF with the account branding. The Asaas PDF is for internal checks. Boleto uses the gateway-provided digitable line and barcode. With Pix, each installment gets its own card with the QR code and the full Pix copy and paste code, without boleto fields such as branch, portfolio or clearing slip. Missing gateway data must not be fabricated.
The payment book shows the current status of each installment. When an installment is paid, canceled, refunded or becomes overdue, and when the plan is canceled or completed, the platform generates the payment book again automatically, within a few seconds. A paid installment shows Paid on with the date; a canceled or refunded installment shows its status prominently. In those cases the payment book carries no QR code, copy and paste code, digitable line or barcode, so the customer does not pay twice. While the payment book is being updated, the plan shows Updating the payment book and sending waits for the new version; the previous file is still available for download.
A canceled or completed plan has no installments left to pay. The payment book is still available for reference, but Send payment book in conversation and Notifications for this plan no longer appear.
Cancellation stops what the gateway allows; archiving organizes the view and does not refund money. Deleting an Asaas native installment agreement is irreversible. Canceling a credit card installment charge cancels every installment still open at the gateway together; installments already paid are preserved. Settled installments require the appropriate refund flow; do not delete them to correct a receipt.
Troubleshooting
Future installments are missing: for capped recurrence, check the projected schedule and wait for gateway issuance.
The payment book is not ready: check generation status and retry after installments are updated.
The payment book shows a paid installment as pending: wait a few seconds while the plan shows Updating the payment book, then download the PDF again. If the notice does not go away, or it says the update failed, use Regenerate payment book on the plan; the previous file stays available meanwhile.
Send payment book in conversation does not appear: the plan was canceled or completed, or the payment book is being updated. To collect a specific installment that is still open, use Send this installment to the conversation in that installment's menu.
Method or cycle unavailable: choose a combination offered by the connection. Mercado Pago recurring Pix is unavailable.
Installments with this method are not yet released: the connection does not have the plan flow released for boleto or Pix yet. Use a single payment or credit card installments.
Installments 2 onward do not appear in the platform: for credit card installments, the sale is recorded as one charge and the gateway manages the installments. Reconciliation lists those installments as unlinked without treating them as failures.
Payment book unavailable for a card plan: payment books exist only for boleto and Pix. On a card plan, each installment has its own payment page.
"Test · not a real payment" notice: the charge or plan was created on a test (sandbox) connection. Everything is created and sent normally, but the payment moves no money. Use the production connection to charge real customers.
Total differs from receipts: check each installment payment, refund and reversal. Receipts increase as installments settle.