Customers
A Customer represents an individual or business with whom you intend to transact with and is programmatically created and managed by a Dwolla Main account via the API. In order for a DwollaAccount to create and manage Customers, an application must obtain permission from Dwolla before being enabled in production. Note: Customers can only be US persons. Business Verified Customers may have non-US Controllers or Beneficial Owners.
Customer types
With a transfer of money, at least one party must complete the identity verification process, either the sender or the receiver. This can be either the Dwolla Main Account itself or averified Customer type. Based on your business model and funds flow, it’s your decision about which party completes this process— you may even want to have both parties complete the identity verification process. A brief description of each Customer type is below, but for a more in-depth overview of each Customer type and what their capabilities are, check out our developer resource article.
Customer Types Overview
A brief description of each Customer type is below, but for a more in-depth overview of each Customer type and what their capabilities are, reference our concept article.
Receive-only Users
Receive-only users are restricted to a “payouts only” funds flow. A receive-only user maintains limited functionality in the API and is only eligible to receive transfers to an attached bank account. This Customer type can only interact with verified Customers and a Dwolla Main Account.Unverified Customers
Unverified Customers have a default sending transaction limit of $5,000 per week. A week is defined as Monday to Sunday UTC time. As this Customer is not identity verified, they will only be able to transact with verified Customers or your Dwolla Main Account.Verified Customers
Verified Customers are defined by their ability to both send and receive money, thus, being able to fit all funds flows. They can also interact with any Customer type and hold abalance funding source within the Dwolla network. Think of the Dwolla balance as a “wallet” which a Customer can send, receive, or hold funds to within the Dwolla network. With no weekly transfer limits, this Customer type is flexible for high transaction volumes.
A verified Customer can be created as a type of either Personal or Business.
Customer links
| Link | Description |
|---|---|
| self | URL of the Customer resource |
| receive | Follow the link to create a transfer to this Customer. |
| funding-sources | GET this link to list the Customer’s funding sources. |
| transfers | GET this link to list the Customer’s transfers |
| send | (optional) If this link exists, this Customer can send funds. POST to this URL to create a transfer. |
| retry-verification | If the Customer has a status of retry, POST to this link to attempt to correct their identity verification information. |
| verify-with-document | If the Verified Customer of type personal or business has a status of document, POST to this link to upload a new color photo document to verify the Customer’s identity. If type business, the controller of the business. Read about Documents. |
| verify-business-with-document | If the Verified Customer of type business has a status of document, POST to this link to upload a new color photo document to verify the identity of the business itself. Read about Documents. |
| verify-controller-and-business-with-document | If the Verified Customer of type business has a status of document, POST to this link to upload new color photo documents to verify the identity of the controller of the business as well as the business itself. Read about Documents. |
| upload-dba-document | If the Verified Customer of type business with a doingBusinessAs name has a status of document, POST to this link to upload a new color photo document containing the DBA name along with the state registered business name to verify the identity of the business itself. Read about Documents. |
Customer resource
| Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
| id | Customer’s unique identifier. |
| firstName | Customer’s first name. |
| lastName | Customer’s last name. |
| Customer’s email address. | |
| type | Either unverified, personal, business, or receive-only. |
| status | If type is unverified or receive-only: status can be unverified, deactivated, or suspended. If type is personal: status can be retry, kba, document, verified, deactivated, or suspended. If type is business: status can be retry, document, verified,deactivated, or suspended. |
| created | ISO-8601 timestamp. |
Customer statuses
| Status | Description |
|---|---|
| unverified | Customers of type unverified or receive-only always have this status. |
| retry | Verified Customers of type personal or business can have this status. The initial verification attempt failed because the information provided did not satisfy our verification check. You can make one additional attempt by changing some or all the attributes of the existing Customer with a POST request. If the additional attempt fails, the resulting status will be either document or suspended. |
| document | Verified Customers of type personal or business can have this status. Dwolla requires additional documentation to identify the Customer in the document status. Read about Documents. |
| verified | Verified Customers of type personal or business can have this status. The Customer is currently verified. |
| suspended | All Customer types can have a status of suspended. The Customer is suspended and may neither send nor receive funds. Contact Dwolla support for more information. |
| deactivated | All Customer types can have a status of deactivated. A deactivated Customer may neither send nor receive funds. A deactivated Customer can be reactivated which moves the Customer to the status they were in prior to being deactivated. |