PSD2 Mandate
The EU's Payment Services Directive 2 requires Strong Customer Authentication (SCA) on most card payments inside the EEA. A "mandate" stores the customer's authorized intent so future off-session charges can succeed without re-authenticating.
PSD2 Mandate
PSD2 (Payment Services Directive 2) is the EU regulation that requires Strong Customer Authentication — typically 3D Secure 2 — on most card-present and card-not-present transactions inside the European Economic Area. To run subscription billing under PSD2, the merchant must capture a "mandate" at the first transaction: a signed authorization that ties the customer's payment method to a recurring agreement, recorded by the card network. Subsequent charges reference that mandate and can run off-session without prompting the user, provided the mandate is still valid.
VULK captures a PSD2 mandate at trial signup. Stripe Checkout is configured with payment_method_options.card.request_three_d_secure = 'any' so the customer always passes 3DS at the entry point, the mandate is registered, and trial-to-subscription rollover charges off-session reliably. This was the fix for a 60% past-due rate on subscription renewals — see the Stripe 3DS mandate decision.
Reverse Trial
A pricing pattern where new users get full access to a paid plan for a short window — at a low introductory price — and downgrade or cancel at the end. VULK uses Reverse Trials at €1.99 / 7d (Builder) and €3.99 / 7d (Pro).
3D Secure (3DS)
An authentication protocol that adds an extra verification step to online card payments — typically a one-time code, biometric, or banking app push. VULK forces 3DS on every checkout to satisfy PSD2 and lock in the subscription mandate.