How To Set up PayPal Payouts

This step-by-step guide covers everything you need to know about linking your Refersion account to PayPal's Payouts.

Shakima avatar
Written by Shakima
Updated over a week ago

With Refersion's PayPal Payouts Integration, you can pay affiliates with just a few clicks. Below are instructions on how to connect your PayPal Payouts account to your Refersion account. 

Requirements to use PayPal Payouts

  1. Please contact PayPal to ensure that Payouts has been enabled for your account. Not all PayPal accounts have this feature enabled automatically, especially if you are outside the U.S.

  2. If you are using PayPal Mass Payments and would like to switch to PayPal Payouts, please email us at [email protected] to have it enabled for your account first.

If you are switching from PayPal Mass Payments, then you should remove your IPN notification in PayPal. You can find the instructions to do that listed here



Connecting your PayPal account

Step 1

Head over to PayPal's Developer portal and click on My Account in the dropdown located on the top left of the screen. You may be asked to log in first.


Step 2

You need to verify that you have the Payouts API enabled. Unfortunately, this might take anywhere from a few hours to several days for PayPal to give you permission. We don't have control over this. However, applying for it is very easy. After going to your Account page, scroll down to the Permissions section. Here you'll want to click the Enable... link to start the process of enabling Payouts.

You'll need to contact PayPal at this point to complete the setup process.

Once Payouts is enabled you'll see a green checkmark in the Live column.

Step 3

Once Payouts is enabled for your account by PayPal, head to your Refersion account. From your dashboard, head to Account > Settings > PayPal Payouts:

Step 4

Click the "Login with PayPal" button and login to your business PayPal account within the little popup window that appears:

Please note: You MUST login to PayPal using the main account holder's email and password instead of a sub-user's credentials.

Once logged in, you'll be asked to confirm the connection between Refersion and PayPal. Click "Agree and Connect".

Once connected, you'll see a green success message like the one below:

After the account is connected, all that's left for you to do is change "Enable PayPal Payouts" to "Yes", Add an email subject line for whe your affiliates receive a new PayPal payment, agree to the terms and save your changes.


Disconnecting your PayPal account

Before you can disconnect your PayPal account in Refersion, you'll need to disconnect the Refersion app connection from your PayPal account.


You can do this in PayPal by clicking this link. You'll be taken to a page that shows all of your account's connected apps. Next to Refersion click delete.


Once this is completed, return to your PayPal settings in Refersion and click "Disconnect PayPal Account" and you're all set.


If you need to manually find the "Login with PayPal" page in PayPal, you can follow the instructions below.

From your PayPal dashboard, navigate to "Your Name" -> Account Settings.


From the account settings page, click "Account Access" then "Login with PayPal".


For a list of common PayPal Payout errors please visit the following support section: Common Errors Associated with Pay Pal Payouts


Is there a fee associated with paying affiliates via PayPal Payouts?

For this integration payment is sent via PayPal's Payouts API. For each bulk payment that is sent, there is a flat fee incurred depending on the currency of commission payment that you are sending. For commission payments in USD, the fee is 0.25 USD per bulk payment. You can click here for additional information.


What's Next?

Please head over to the article How To Test Your Paypal Integration to read our step by step guide about how to perform a test transaction to make sure that PayPal Payouts is configured properly.

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