Payment methods: getting paid
Add the ways you accept payment — Zelle, Venmo, ACH, or Check — and how Bluebridge keeps your bank info secure.
Payment methods live in Profile → Tax & Finance → Payment methods. You add one row per method, drag to reorder by preference, and your assignors see the top-priority entries when it’s time to cut you a check.
The four kinds
- Zelle — your enrolled email or US phone number. Most banks settle these same-day.
- Venmo — your handle (without the leading @). Assignors paste it into the Venmo app.
- ACH — bank routing + account number + account-holder name. We validate the routing number against the ABA checksum before saving, and (when we recognize it) tag the bank name on save.
- Check — payee name + mailing address. Lands on your invoice PDFs as a "make payable to…" block.
How priority works
The list is ordered top-to-bottom by preference. The number-1 entry is your default and appears first wherever Bluebridge surfaces "pay me by…" — on your invoice PDFs, on the assignor-facing "Pay official" sheet, and in the payment-methods share email. Drag a row to a new position; the page saves the reorder automatically.
Sensitive data — what we protect, and how
- Zelle handle, Venmo username, and Check payee + address are plain text. Assignors need to read these to send you money — there’s no value in hiding them.
- ACH (routing + account + account-holder name) is the only sensitive bucket. We encrypt the whole record at the application layer with AES-256-GCM before it touches the database. The encryption key lives only in our server environment, never in the database, and never reaches your browser.
- In the UI you only ever see the last 4 digits of your account number (e.g. "ACH ending 1234") once it’s saved. Editing the row requires retyping the full number — we don’t round-trip the stored value back to your browser.
- When you share payment methods with an assignor, only the kinds and the same redacted ACH preview travel. The cleartext routing/account number is decrypted in server memory at the moment Bluebridge fills a payment-methods share email (or your invoice PDF) and then discarded.
Where assignors see them
Your methods are visible to any assignor or admin on Bluebridge in two surfaces:
- Event page applicant rows — under each accepted official's name on /events/[id], the assignor sees a small "Preferred pay" line listing the top method(s), with click-to-copy on the identifier.
- All Officials directory — every row on /officials shows the same Preferred pay line, so an assignor can grab your handle / ACH numbers without first having to put you on one of their events.
- Your invoice PDFs — the "PAY VIA" block at the bottom of every invoice renders directly from this list.
Sharing with an assignor
When you want to push your methods to a specific assignor by email (instead of relying on them seeing the inline line), hit "Share with…" inside the Payment methods card and pick the recipient. Bluebridge sends them a single email with your current top-priority methods. You can re-share at any time; the email always reflects the live state of the list. Assignors can't request your methods directly — you're always the one initiating.
ACH: authorizing Bluebridge to deposit
When you add or edit an ACH method, below the Account holder name field there's a checkbox: Authorize Bluebridge to deposit payments to this account. This is opt-in consent — until you check it, Bluebridge will never initiate a deposit to that bank account, even on events that are otherwise powered by Bluebridge. You can revoke at any time by unchecking the box or deleting the method. See Authorizing Bluebridge deposits for the full explanation of when this actually triggers a deposit.
Removing a method
Trash a row from the card to remove it. ACH rows are dropped along with their encrypted blob; there’s no recovery path. Add a fresh entry if you switch banks or update your handle.