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# Understand Pay Out autopays

> Understand how Pay Out autopays automate recurring vendor payouts and connect to bills

A Pay Out autopay — called a payout subscription in the API — is a scheduled, recurring payout to a vendor. At each occurrence, Payabli pays the vendor's selected payment method automatically, with no manual action required. Pay Out autopays are only available with on-demand payables. Managed payables don't support autopays. This is useful any time you pay the same vendor the same amount on a regular cadence: rent share to property owners, recurring contractor payments, commissions, or standing vendor bills.

> **Info**
>
> Pay In also has an autopay concept, but it serves a different purpose: receiving recurring payments from customers rather than scheduled disbursements to vendors. See [Understand Pay In autopays](/guides/pay-in-autopays-overview).

## Pay Out autopays are schedule-driven only

Pay Out autopays work on fixed schedules. You set an amount and a recurring interval anchored to a start date: weekly, every two weeks, monthly, quarterly, every six months, or annually. You can set an end date, or let the autopay run until you cancel it.

Pay In autopays support both fixed schedules and balance-driven autopays. There's no balance-driven equivalent for Pay Out. Vendors don't carry an open balance the way customers do in Pay In, so every occurrence pays the configured amount.

## Pay Out autopays and bills

Each occurrence of a payout autopay pays a bill. You can point the autopay at specific bill details when you create it — a bill number, due date, and notes. If you don't add bill details, Payabli creates a bill automatically at execution time and pays it through the standard batching and funding flow.

## Payment methods

Pay Out autopays support ACH, virtual cards (vCard), and paper checks.

In the portal create flow, payment method is a separate step from delivery. Payabli doesn't offer **Send Vendor Link** for autopays — sending a new link at every recurring occurrence would generate too many vendor links. You always click **Select How Vendor Gets Paid**, then choose the payment method: ACH, vCard, or check.

## How autopays execute

Pay Out autopay transactions typically run between 2:30 AM and 3:30 AM Eastern time.

Autopays can be paused, resumed, or canceled (deleted) at any time.

## Related resources

See these related resources to help you get the most out of Payabli.

#### Related topics

* **[Create an autopay](/guides/pay-out-portal-autopays-create)** - Schedule automatic recurring payouts to vendors directly from their record in the Payabli Portal
* **[Manage autopays](/guides/pay-out-portal-autopays-manage)** - View, edit, pause, resume, and cancel scheduled payout autopays from the Payabli Portal
* **[Manage payout subscriptions with the API](/guides/pay-out-developer-payout-subscriptions-manage)** - Learn how to create, update, and delete automated recurring payouts to vendors with the Payabli API
* **[Pay Out cookbook](/cookbooks/pay-out)** - Includes the Set up autopay on a bill recipe, which creates a payout subscription that references an existing bill.

#### Often confused with

**Understand Pay In autopays** - Pay In also has an autopay concept, but it's for recurring charges to customers — not scheduled disbursements to vendors. See [Understand Pay In autopays](/guides/pay-in-autopays-overview)