Contractor Payments

Pay your team members, contractors, and volunteers directly through Rhythmic. Payments are processed securely via Stripe and deposited into each recipient’s bank account.

How It Works

Rhythmic uses Stripe Connect to move funds from your organization’s bank account to your team members. When you approve a payment, Rhythmic debits your bank account via ACH, then transfers the funds to the recipient’s connected account. The recipient receives an automatic payout to their bank — typically within 5–7 business days from approval.

Setting Up Your Organization

Configure Tax Settings

Before issuing payments, configure your organization’s tax compliance settings. Navigate to Organization Settings → Tax Compliance and review the following options:

• Tax exempt — Enable this if your organization is tax-exempt and payments are not subject to 1099 reporting.
• W-9 required — When enabled, Rhythmic will show a warning when you create a payment for a member who hasn’t submitted their W-9 form. This is advisory only and won’t block the payment.
• 1099 threshold — Set the dollar amount at which Rhythmic warns you about 1099 reporting requirements. The IRS default is $600.

Connect Your Bank Account

Your organization needs a connected bank account to fund payments. Navigate to Organization Settings → Payment Settings and follow these steps:

1. Click Add Bank Account.
2. A secure form powered by Stripe will appear. Select your bank and sign in to verify your account instantly, or enter your routing and account numbers for manual verification via micro-deposits.
3. Once verified, your bank account is saved and ready to fund payments. You’ll see the bank name and last four digits displayed on the settings page.

Member Setup

Each member who will receive payments needs to complete a one-time onboarding process to verify their identity and connect their bank account. There are two ways this can happen.

Self-Service Onboarding

Members can set up their own payment information. They navigate to their settings and complete an onboarding flow powered by Stripe, which collects their name, date of birth, address, Social Security number, and bank account. Stripe handles all identity verification securely — Rhythmic never stores sensitive financial data directly.

Admin-Assisted Setup

If you already have a member’s information on file, you can submit it on their behalf from the member’s profile page. The member will see a prompt the next time they log in asking them to accept Stripe’s terms of service — just a single click, no forms to fill out.

Onboarding Status

You can check a member’s payment readiness from the Payments page or the member’s profile. Members will show one of these statuses:

• Not started — The member hasn’t begun onboarding yet.
• In progress — Onboarding is underway but not complete (either self-service or waiting for ToS acceptance).
• Verifying — All information has been submitted and Stripe is verifying the member’s identity.
• Active — The member is fully set up and can receive payments.
• Restricted — Stripe needs the member to update their information (for example, an expired document). The member will be prompted to resolve this.

Creating Payments

Navigate to Payments and click New Payment.

1. Select the member you want to pay from the dropdown.
2. Enter the payment amount in dollars. Rhythmic will display any tax compliance warnings if the payment pushes the member over the 1099 threshold or if they haven’t submitted a W-9 form.
3. Add an optional memo describing what the payment is for.
4. Click Create Payment. The payment is created in Submitted status, ready for approval.

Approving and Processing

From the Payments page, click on a submitted payment and select Approve. Once approved:

• If the recipient’s payment setup is complete, the payment is automatically sent to Stripe for processing. Your bank account will be debited via ACH.
• If the recipient hasn’t completed their setup yet, the payment will be held (stalled) until they do. Once they finish onboarding, the payment resumes automatically — no action needed from you.

You can also cancel any payment that hasn’t been processed yet, or mark as paid manually for payments handled outside of Stripe (cash, check, etc.).

Payment Statuses

Handling Failures

If a payment fails, you’ll receive a notification with details about what went wrong. Common reasons include insufficient funds in the organization’s bank account, a closed bank account, or an issue with the recipient’s banking information.

From the payment detail view, you can see the error message and choose to Retry the payment or Cancel it. If the issue is with the recipient’s bank account, they’ll also receive a notification asking them to update their information.

Invoices and Exports

When a payment is marked as paid, Rhythmic automatically generates a PDF invoice and emails it to the recipient. Admins and members can download invoices at any time from the payment detail view.

For accounting and tax reporting, you can export your payments as a CSV file. From the Payments page, use the Export button to download a spreadsheet filtered by date range and status. This is useful for 1099 preparation at year-end.

Notifications

Rhythmic sends notifications at key points in the payment lifecycle:

• Payment issued — The member is notified when a payment is created for them.
• Payment paid — The member receives an invoice email when funds are delivered.
• Payment failed — Both the member and admins with billing permission are notified if something goes wrong.

Members can manage their notification preferences from their settings page. Admins with the billing permission will always receive failure notifications.

Permissions

Only admins, owners, and members with the billing permission can access the payments page and create, approve, or manage payments. You can grant this permission from the Members page by editing a member’s permissions.

All members can view their own payment history and download their invoices from their settings page, regardless of permissions.

Tips

• Encourage your team members to complete their payment setup early. Payments approved for members who haven’t finished onboarding will be held until they do.
• ACH transfers take 4–5 business days to settle. Plan your payment schedule accordingly so recipients receive funds on time.
• Use the CSV export at the end of the year to simplify 1099 reporting. The export includes per-member totals, dates, and status information.
• A member’s payment setup carries across organizations. If someone works with multiple churches on Rhythmic, they only need to complete onboarding once.