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Show HN: Paid, an API for invoicing

paidapi.com

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Re: Show HN: Paid, an API for invoicing

#21

Post by xrstf »

ryanwjackson wrote: post #17
xrstf wrote: post #13

I really like the clean API docs, well done! Did you build it on your own or is that some REST doc framework? The only thing I was missing from the API (maybe those are there but left out in the docs, which would be totally fine) are links between your resources (to make it a bit more actual REST). You already more promimently documented the usecase ("create an invoice") instead of listing URL endpoints, but with lin…

The docs are an awesome repo by TripIt ( https://github.com/tripit/slate ). They aren't perfect, but they get you pretty far pretty quickly. Not sure what you mean by "links between your resources." Have an example? May be there (or we can build it if not). Correct on Unix time. Just being extra redundant.

Roy says[1] that to be truly RESTful, your resources (documents) need to be linked between each other, just like HTML pages. There are no definite standards yet (that I'm aware of), but JSON HAL[1] seems to be on the IETF standards track to be the one solution we settle on (just like we "settled on" in HTML). See also [3] for a broader overview on links in JSON and [4] for more information on resource linking and stuff in general.

[1] http://roy.gbiv.com/untangled/2008/rest-apis-must-be-hyperte...

[2] http://stateless.co/hal_specification.html

[3] https://www.mnot.net/blog/2011/11/25/linking_in_json

[4] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HATEOAS

Re: Show HN: Paid, an API for invoicing

#24

Post by ryanwjackson »

tarr11 wrote: post #19

This is pretty cool. So, I am using Stripe, which is great, but has a few drawbacks right now. I'm also using churnbuster, which is nice (does your "chase" feature do what they do?) Here's my problems: 1. Some of my customers pay by check 2. Sometimes my customers have an out of date credit card, or haven't given it to me yet, and Stripe won't let me change their subscription to one that charges them. 3. I occasional…

1. Many of our customers get paid by checks. We receive checks for some of them, and our goal is to make as easy as possible to reconcile those payments.

2. If your customer's card is out of date, we prompt the customer to update their card and store it back to Stripe for you.

3. You aren't alone. Some customers use us for pieces of their transaction volume (i.e. only the invoiced customers or only customer paying via ACH)

4. A la #3, you can send us a portion or all. We're also happy to help you get started. It's free to get set up, so you can try it out. We also provide a test environment so you can play around with it as much as you want.

Feel free to always shoot us an email at hello@paidapi.com.!

Re: Show HN: Paid, an API for invoicing

#25

Post by joncalhoun »

brettcvz wrote: post #6

Are there any companies who are using this currently? Can anyone speak to how it's working for them?

We (nomadbits.com) have been using it and everything has been great so far.

We help companies with APIs improve their developer onboarding process, which means we invoice both monthly services (like creating and maintaining high quality API libraries), as well as one-off consulting (like updating documentation and creating "Getting Started" guides), and Paid has been great for both use cases.

Do you have any specific questions?

Full Disclosure - Paid is a customer of ours as well, so we may be slightly biased :D

Re: Show HN: Paid, an API for invoicing

#26

Post by cannikin »

Does the laptop in the splash photo bother anyone else? It looks like they photoshopped the keyboard to be much shorter. Look how tall the screen is, then imagine you folded that down to meet the keyboard. That's no laptop I've ever seen!

Re: Show HN: Paid, an API for invoicing

#27

Post by yarone »

Animats wrote: post #20

It's just an invoicing program. There are lots of those. Intuit's is widely used. Oracle is also in that business. There's "Anytime Collect", "Zencash", "Esker", "Celtrino". and many others. The more advanced players support electronic data interchange (EDI), where your accounts receivable system connects to the buyer's accounts payable system. Many large companies require EDI for suppliers who generate a lot of invo…

"Any new system should have EDI interchange with at least all Fortune 1000 companies."

See Freshbooks. They also started as a dead-simple invoicing system. I think without EDI. And I believe they still don't have EDI. They've grown very nicely over the years.

Re: Show HN: Paid, an API for invoicing

#28

Post by sleepyhead »

Animats wrote: post #20

It's just an invoicing program. There are lots of those. Intuit's is widely used. Oracle is also in that business. There's "Anytime Collect", "Zencash", "Esker", "Celtrino". and many others. The more advanced players support electronic data interchange (EDI), where your accounts receivable system connects to the buyer's accounts payable system. Many large companies require EDI for suppliers who generate a lot of invo…

"Paid is a simple API" and you are comparing to Oracle?

"Paid is a simple API" but yet you "Many large companies require EDI"?

"It's just an invoicing program." aka "Instagram is just a photo sharing app". Btw invoicing programs aren't trivial (speaking of experience). Even when looking at basic features it is still about actual money.

Re: Show HN: Paid, an API for invoicing

#29

Post by marquis »

mikeknoop wrote: post #12
marquis wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you integrate it with Xero? (Rather than relying on Zapier)

I'd love to hear why you don't want to rely on Zapier for this, any feedback?

Some of the APIs we use break often with Zapier (not Zapier's fault). It's easier to have direct integration and let the vendor deal with it.
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