What’s the Difference Between a Purchase ID and Transaction ID?

Every PayKickstart transaction includes a unique Purchase ID, which is prefixed with PK-P followed by a random string. In the IPN POST data, this is referred to as the invoice_id.

Additionally, each transaction has a unique Transaction ID, prefixed with PK-T and followed by a random string. In the IPN POST data, this is referred to as the transaction_id.

For each front-end purchase, PayKickstart generates both a purchase record and an associated transaction record. In the IPN POST data, these are represented as invoice_id (for the purchase) and transaction_id (for the transaction).

• For one-time purchases, a unique Purchase ID and Transaction ID will be generated for each successful checkout.

• For subscription purchases, a unique Purchase ID and Transaction ID will be created during the initial checkout. For all subsequent rebills, the Transaction ID will change, but the Purchase ID will remain the same, linking all rebill transactions to the original purchase.

For example:

Purchase ID: https://app.paykickstart.com/admin/transactions?q=PK-PXXXXXXXX

Transaction ID: https://app.paykickstart.com/admin/transactions?q=PK-TXXXXXXXX

In both cases, the system will pull up the same transaction because the purchase in this case only has 1 transaction linked to it. If you searched using the purchase_id on a subscription in which rebills have already occurred, you’d see multiple transactions.