Gateway problems fall into two groups: the gateway is refusing transactions, or the site and gateway are not talking properly. The first is usually an account or credential issue; the second is configuration. The error a customer sees is generic in both cases, so the answer is always in the gateway’s own logs rather than on the site.
Before you buy, one quick look
Read-only.
Log into your gateway dashboard — Stripe, PayPal, or whichever you use — and find the recent transactions or logs. Look at a failed one and read the reason given.
A decline reason from the gateway is a different problem from an integration error. The first is usually the customer’s bank or a risk rule; the second is on the site, and that is what this fixes.
Payment gateway integration errors
Your payment gateway is rejecting, erroring or behaving inconsistently. We check the integration on both sides and get transactions flowing again.
- Full backup taken before we start
- If we can’t fix it, you get your money back
- We never ask for your own password
This or something else?
| Gateway errors or transactions failing | This fix covers it |
| Order created but stuck unpaid | Order stuck in processing or pending |
| Webhooks not reaching the site | PayPal / Stripe webhook repair |
| Checkout fails before payment | Checkout failure diagnosis |
| Account suspended by the provider | Contact the provider first |
What you are seeing
- Transactions failing or erroring at the payment step
- The gateway may show declines, errors, or nothing at all
- It may affect all payments or only certain cards or countries
- It may have started after a key rotation or account change
- Test mode may work while live mode does not
Common causes
- API keys mismatched, expired, or still set to test mode
- The gateway plugin outdated and using a retired API version
- Currency or country settings not matching what the account supports
- A risk or fraud rule at the gateway rejecting legitimate transactions
- Two payment plugins installed and interfering with each other
What we do
- Take a full backup before touching anything
- Read the gateway’s own logs to see what it received and what it returned
- Verify keys, API version, currency and mode against the account settings
- Check for conflicting payment plugins or duplicated integrations
- Correct the configuration and update the integration where needed
- Run a live test transaction and refund it to confirm
What is included
- Payments processing correctly, verified with a real transaction
- Keys, API version and account settings aligned
- A note on what was misconfigured
- The pre-fix backup, kept for 30 days
Not included
- Resolving account holds, reserves or suspensions at your provider
- Applying for a new merchant account on your behalf
- Changing to a different gateway, which we quote separately
- Design changes or content work
Questions about this fix
The gateway says my account is fine. So why does it fail?
Because the account being healthy and the integration being correct are different things. Wrong keys, a retired API version or a currency mismatch all produce failures on a perfectly good account. The gateway logs distinguish them.
Some cards work and others do not. Is that my site?
Usually not. Selective declines normally come from the issuing bank or a risk rule at the gateway. We confirm from the logs, and if it is genuinely a risk rule we tell you which one so you can adjust it with your provider.
Test mode works but live does not. What is different?
Almost always keys or webhooks. Live and test have separate credentials and separate webhook endpoints, and it is very easy to configure one and forget the other. It is the first thing we check.
I have two payment plugins installed — is that automatically the problem?
Not automatically, but it's the first thing we rule out. Two integrations can coexist fine or can quietly fight over the same hooks — the gateway logs and a look at your active plugins tell us which situation you're in.
Could this only be affecting certain countries?
Yes, and it's a useful detail — gateway rules often vary by region for fraud or compliance reasons, so a configuration that works for domestic cards can fail for international ones for entirely legitimate reasons on the gateway's side.
Related fixes
If this is the second time this year
A bad update breaking the site is a symptom of updates not being tested first. Care plans run every update on a staging clone before it reaches your live site, which is the actual fix for this happening again.
Your access, your rules
Create a separate admin account for us and delete it when we are done. For anything else, we get in touch and agree a method — never a form field on this site, never by reply to an email.
We back up first, always
Before anything is touched we take a full backup and keep it for 30 days. If a fix goes wrong, we put the site back exactly as it was.
If it is not what you bought
If the problem turns out smaller than what you ordered, we refund the difference. If it is bigger, we stop and send a quote before doing any extra work.
If we cannot fix it
You get back what we received. Diagnosis is on us — you only pay when the problem is actually solved. The payment processor takes its fee before the money reaches us, so we never hold it and it is not ours to return. That is true here as everywhere else.
If it comes back
Reply within seven days of delivery and we put it back on the bench at no cost. The fix is not finished until it holds.
What we are responsible for
If something goes wrong with a fix, our responsibility is limited to what you paid for it. We take a full backup first so mistakes can be undone, and we tell you before doing anything outside what you bought.