# Payments down alerts

> Failing payments are one of four floors in Pagerless: the AI is never allowed to call them noise. If checkout breaks at 3 a.m., someone gets a call.

URL: https://pagerless.dev/solutions/payments-down-alerts
Updated: 2026-10-22

## What counts as payments failing

3 or more payment errors, and at least 2% of payment requests when request counts are known. An error counts as a payment error when its route or tags mention payment, checkout, billing, pay, Stripe, PayPal, Braintree, Adyen, Razorpay or Paddle. Failing calls to Stripe and PayPal are tagged by name by the Node SDK, so they count with no extra code.

## What happens

1. **Wake** Push to your phone at once, then a call after 5 minutes without a tap.
2. **Explain** "Payments failing since the 3:08 update" or "Stripe is returning errors; nothing changed on your side."
3. **Fix** If your deploy caused it, undo with one tap. If Stripe is down, there is nothing to undo, and the alert says so.

## Or straight from Stripe

Add a [Stripe webhook](https://pagerless.dev/integrations/stripe) to Pagerless: failed payments count toward the floor and successes are the baseline, with or without the SDK. One decline never wakes anyone.

## Report your own payment errors

```js
import { capture } from "pagerless";

capture(err, { route: "POST /checkout", tags: { dependency: "stripe" } });
```