How to Use the Payment Received Trigger in Sparkforge

By Sparkforge Support Team ·Last reviewed May 3, 2026

The Payment Received trigger fires whenever Sparkforge records a successful payment from any source — funnels, invoices, calendars, memberships, manual entries, or external integrations. Filter by source, product, status, and gateway to drive confirmations, internal alerts, and post-purchase fulfillment.

The Payment Received trigger fires when Sparkforge records a successful payment. It works across funnels, invoices, calendars, memberships, forms, the storefront, manual entries, and external integrations like Stripe and PayPal. Use it for confirmations, internal alerts, fulfillment, upsells, and recovery on failed transactions.

What the Payment Received trigger does

It activates a workflow the moment a payment processes through Sparkforge — one-time charges, subscription renewals, and invoice payments included. You decide what runs after: send a receipt, tag the contact, alert the team, grant access, or branch on success vs. failure.

Why it is useful

Instant confirmations: deliver email or SMS receipts the second a payment lands.
CRM updates: apply tags, set custom fields, or drop internal notes automatically.
Team alerts: notify sales, support, or fulfillment in real time.
Upsells and access grants: kick off bonus delivery or membership access by product.
Failed payment recovery: branch on Payment Status = Failed for retries and dunning.
Subscription and invoice tracking: tie recurring payments to follow-up actions.

Configure the trigger

Go to Automation > Workflows and click + Create Workflow > Start from Scratch.
Click + Add New Trigger, scroll to the Payments section, and pick Payment Received.
Name the trigger something specific, like Course access payment.
Click + Add filters to scope the trigger.
Click Save Trigger.

Filter options

Source

Where the payment originated. Each source maps to a real Sparkforge surface:

Calendar: payment on a calendar appointment.
External: third-party gateways like Stripe, PayPal, or API charges.
Form: a form with a payment element.
Funnel: a one-step or two-step order form.
Invoice: a Sparkforge invoice payment.
Manual Payment: a payment entered by a user inside the CRM.
Memberships: a membership product or course purchase.
Website: a storefront product or subscription purchase.

Standard fields

Global Product: trigger only on a specific product.
Payment Status: set to Success for a clean trigger or Failed for recovery flows.
Source / Sub-Source: stack to scope to one funnel, calendar, or storefront category.

Stripe recurring charges

Sparkforge does not have a Stripe-specific trigger — the architecture is gateway-agnostic by design. Recurring Stripe charges are captured by three different triggers, each with a different sweet spot:

Trigger	Fires on recurring charge?	Best for
Payment Received	Yes — filter by Customer not present / subscription transaction	Most granular control. Gateway-agnostic. Supports failed payments via Payment Status. Rich `{{payment.*}}` values: card last4, brand, transaction ID, gateway.
Order Submitted	Yes — fires on successful recurring charges	Post-purchase upsells and Shopping Cart email auto-population. Order-level values: cart total, products, coupon, gateway. V2 funnels only.
Subscription	Lifecycle events only (create, update, pause, resume, cancel)	Reacting to subscription state changes, not individual charges.

How to choose

React to every recurring charge, including failures: Payment Received with the subscription-transaction filter plus a Payment Status filter.
Send confirmation emails after recurring charges: Order Submitted, because the Shopping Cart email element auto-populates line items.
React to subscription state changes: the Subscription trigger.

Important notes

The Stripe One-Time Charge action is for one-time charges only. For recurring Stripe billing, set up the subscription in Stripe directly, then react with one of the triggers above.
Order Submitted requires V2 funnels. On V1, use Payment Received.
All three triggers work across Stripe, PayPal, Authorize.net, and NMI — Sparkforge normalizes payment events.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I filter by product or membership plan?

Yes. Use the Global Product filter for products, and stack Source plus Sub-Source to pinpoint payments from a specific funnel, calendar, or membership.

Can the trigger fire on failed payments?

Yes. Add a Payment Status filter set to Failed. This is the right place to build retry sequences and dunning emails.

Can I reference payment amount or transaction ID in messages?

Yes. Custom values like {{payment.amount}}, {{payment.transactionId}}, {{payment.cardLast4}}, and {{payment.gateway}} are available in any downstream email or notification.

How do I test the trigger?

Run a real payment in a sandbox environment or charge a low-priced test product. Make sure the workflow is published before testing, then verify in Workflow History.

Is there a Stripe-specific recurring charge trigger?

No — the architecture is gateway-agnostic. Use Payment Received with the subscription-transaction filter, Order Submitted on V2 funnels, or the Subscription trigger for lifecycle events.