Integrating UAE Payment Gateways into Your App: A Practical Guide to Telr and PayTabs

If you're building a commercial app for the UAE market, you will eventually hit the payment gateway question.

Stripe works globally but isn't the default choice here. The UAE has its own dominant gateways — Telr and PayTabs are the two you'll encounter most — and while both have documentation, the docs leave a lot of gaps that only show up when you're actually integrating.

This is the guide I wish existed before we built our first payment flow for a UAE client.

Why not just use Stripe?

Stripe does operate in the UAE, but there are real reasons local gateways get chosen instead:

• Local acquiring banks — Telr and PayTabs process through UAE banks, which means lower decline rates on local cards and faster settlement
• Network International and Mashreq support — common UAE card networks that local gateways handle natively
• Arabic interface support — important for consumer-facing checkouts
• Compliance familiarity — local gateways understand UAE Central Bank (CBUAE) requirements out of the box
• Client preference — many UAE businesses specifically request a local gateway in their contracts

For most UAE-market apps, you'll be integrating one of these two. Here's how they differ in practice.

Telr vs PayTabs — the practical difference

Telr

• SDKs: iOS, Android, Web
• Hosted payment page: yes
• Direct API (card data): yes, requires PCI compliance
• Recurring billing: yes
• Multi-currency: yes
• Sandbox: yes
• Documentation: patchy — expect to fill gaps yourself
• Best for: enterprise clients who specifically request it, established UAE merchants

PayTabs

• SDKs: iOS, Android, Web, Flutter (official package)
• Hosted payment page: yes
• Direct API (card data): yes, requires PCI compliance
• Recurring billing: yes
• Multi-currency: yes
• Sandbox: yes
• Documentation: better structured, still has gaps
• Best for: Flutter apps, faster integrations, Arabic checkout out of the box

The Flutter SDK is the deciding factor for most mobile projects — PayTabs has one, Telr doesn't. If your client hasn't specified a gateway, start with PayTabs.

Setting up Telr

1. Get your credentials

After creating a merchant account, you'll receive:

• store_id — your merchant identifier
• authkey — your API authentication key

These go in your server-side environment variables. Never expose them client-side.

2. Create a payment order (server-side)

Telr uses a hosted payment page approach for most integrations. You create an order from your backend and redirect the user to Telr's checkout.

// Node.js example
const axios = require('axios');

async function createTelrOrder({ amount, currency, orderId, customerEmail, returnUrl, cancelUrl }) {
  const payload = {
    method: 'create',
    store: process.env.TELR_STORE_ID,
    authkey: process.env.TELR_AUTH_KEY,
    order: {
      cartid: orderId,
      test: process.env.NODE_ENV === 'production' ? '0' : '1', // 1 = test mode
      amount: amount.toFixed(2),
      currency: currency || 'AED',
      description: `Order ${orderId}`,
    },
    return: {
      authorised: returnUrl,
      declined: cancelUrl,
      cancelled: cancelUrl,
    },
    customer: {
      email: customerEmail,
    },
  };

  const response = await axios.post('https://secure.telr.com/gateway/order.json', payload);
  return response.data;
}

The response includes an order.url — redirect the user there to complete payment.

3. Handle the return

Telr redirects back to your authorised or declined URL with an order_ref parameter. You then verify the payment status server-side:

async function verifyTelrPayment(orderRef) {
  const payload = {
    method: 'check',
    store: process.env.TELR_STORE_ID,
    authkey: process.env.TELR_AUTH_KEY,
    order: {
      ref: orderRef,
    },
  };

  const response = await axios.post('https://secure.telr.com/gateway/order.json', payload);
  const status = response.data?.order?.status?.code;

  // 3 = authorised, -1 = declined, -2 = cancelled
  return {
    success: status === 3,
    status,
    data: response.data,
  };
}

Important: Always verify server-side. Never trust a client-side redirect parameter to confirm payment.

4. Sandbox gotchas

• Use test card 4111 1111 1111 1111 with any future expiry and CVV 123
• Set order.test to 1 — forgetting this is the most common mistake in sandbox
• Telr sandbox and production use the same endpoint — the test flag controls which environment processes the transaction

Setting up PayTabs

PayTabs has a cleaner API structure and better Flutter support, making it the faster integration for mobile-first apps.

1. Get your credentials

From your PayTabs merchant dashboard:

• profile_id — your merchant profile
• server_key — for server-side API calls
• client_key — safe to use client-side (in their SDK)

2. Create a payment page (server-side)

// Node.js example
async function createPayTabsPayment({ amount, currency, orderId, customerName, customerEmail, returnUrl, callbackUrl }) {
  const payload = {
    profile_id: process.env.PAYTABS_PROFILE_ID,
    tran_type: 'sale',
    tran_class: 'ecom',
    cart_id: orderId,
    cart_currency: currency || 'AED',
    cart_amount: amount,
    cart_description: `Order ${orderId}`,
    paypage_lang: 'en', // or 'ar' for Arabic checkout
    customer_details: {
      name: customerName,
      email: customerEmail,
    },
    return: returnUrl,
    callback: callbackUrl, // server-to-server notification
  };

  const response = await axios.post(
    'https://secure.paytabs.com/payment/request',
    payload,
    {
      headers: {
        authorization: process.env.PAYTABS_SERVER_KEY,
      },
    }
  );

  return response.data; // includes redirect_url
}

Redirect the user to redirect_url from the response.

3. Handle the callback (IPN)

PayTabs sends a server-to-server callback to your callback URL when a transaction completes. This is more reliable than relying on the return redirect.

// Express.js callback handler
app.post('/payment/callback', async (req, res) => {
  const { tran_ref, payment_result } = req.body;

  // Verify the transaction server-side
  const verifyResponse = await axios.post(
    'https://secure.paytabs.com/payment/query',
    {
      profile_id: process.env.PAYTABS_PROFILE_ID,
      tran_ref,
    },
    {
      headers: { authorization: process.env.PAYTABS_SERVER_KEY },
    }
  );

  const result = verifyResponse.data?.payment_result?.response_status;

  if (result === 'A') {
    // Payment authorised — update your order
  }

  res.sendStatus(200); // Always return 200 to acknowledge receipt
});

4. Flutter SDK integration

PayTabs maintains an official Flutter package: flutter_paytabs_bridge on pub.dev.

// pubspec.yaml
dependencies:
  flutter_paytabs_bridge: ^2.x.x

import 'package:flutter_paytabs_bridge/PaymentSdkConfigurationDetails.dart';
import 'package:flutter_paytabs_bridge/flutter_paytabs_bridge.dart';

void startPayment() {
  PaytabsFlutter.startPayment(
    configuration: PaymentSDKConfiguration(
      profileID: "your_profile_id",
      serverKey: "your_server_key", // use client_key here in mobile
      clientKey: "your_client_key",
      cartID: "order_123",
      cartDescription: "Product description",
      merchantCountryCode: "AE",
      currency: "AED",
      amount: 100.0,
      screenTitle: "Checkout",
      billingDetails: BillingDetails(
        name: "Customer Name",
        email: "customer@email.com",
        countryCode: "AE",
      ),
    ),
    callback: (event) {
      if (event["status"] == "success") {
        // handle success
      } else if (event["status"] == "error") {
        // handle error
      }
    },
  );
}

Things that will catch you out

1. AED is the default but not always the setting
Both gateways support multi-currency but default behaviour varies by account configuration. Confirm your merchant account currency settings before going live — a mismatch causes silent failures in sandbox that only appear in production.

2. 3D Secure is mandatory for UAE-issued cards
UAE banks require 3DS authentication for card-not-present transactions. Both gateways handle this, but your integration needs to account for the additional redirect step in the payment flow. Don't design your UX assuming a single-step checkout.

3. Test with real UAE cards before launch
Sandbox test cards pass through without 3DS. Real UAE-issued cards trigger it. Test your complete flow with an actual card in a staging environment before you go live — the 3DS redirect behaviour can break flows that seemed to work perfectly in sandbox.

4. Callback URLs must be publicly accessible
If you're developing locally, use ngrok or a similar tunnel for your callback URL. PayTabs and Telr can't reach localhost.

5. Idempotency — build it in from the start
Network timeouts can cause duplicate payment attempts. Generate a unique cart_id / order_id per transaction attempt and check for it before processing. Both gateways will process duplicates if you let them.

Which one should you use?

• Building a Flutter app? Start with PayTabs — the official Flutter SDK saves meaningful integration time.
• Enterprise client requiring Telr specifically? Telr is fine; just expect to spend more time on the integration and account setup.
• Need Arabic checkout? Both support it. PayTabs makes it a single parameter (paypage_lang: 'ar').
• Need recurring billing? Both support it. Telr's implementation is more documented.

For most new projects in the UAE, PayTabs is the faster path to production.

Resources

• Telr API docs: docs.telr.com
• PayTabs technical portal: docs.paytabs.com
• PayTabs developer hub: dev.paytabs.com
• PayTabs Flutter package: pub.dev/packages/flutter_paytabs_bridge
• PayTabs Postman collection: documenter.getpostman.com

We build mobile and web apps for the UAE market at Daiyra 360 Communications — payment gateway integration is something we set up on almost every project. If something in this guide is outdated or wrong, drop a comment and we'll update it.