Telnyx AI agent PCI payments: the caller keys their card outside the conversation, and Shuttle charges it as the connector for Telnyx's TeXML Pay verb.
An agent that can answer every question but cannot take the payment can lose the sale at the last step. This guide covers how a voice agent on Telnyx collects a card without the card reaching the model, and where Shuttle fits.
Collecting a Payment Is Not the Same as Paying a Bill
Telnyx publishes a template for an outbound agent that calls a utility or financial IVR and pays a bill, using keypad tones to get through the menus. That is useful, but it runs the opposite way to what this guide covers.
Paying a bill means your agent is the caller. It dials someone else's phone system and keys in details you already hold.
Collecting a payment means your agent is on a call with a customer, inbound or outbound, and the customer gives a card the agent has never seen. Here the card belongs to the caller, so keeping it out of your systems is the whole problem. The moment card details reach your agent, your model, transcripts, logs and recordings are in PCI scope with them.
This guide is about the second one.
The Rule That Shapes the Design
Whatever you build, the card must never reach the agent. Not the model, not the transcript, not the logs, not the recording.
So the payment is its own step. The conversation pauses, the card is captured outside the conversation, the result comes back as an outcome rather than a card number, and the agent carries on knowing only whether the payment worked.
A recording that catches a card's security code holds data PCI DSS does not allow you to keep after authorisation. Keeping the card out of the conversation keeps it out of the recording too.
How Telnyx Handles the Payment Step
Telnyx Voice Payments takes the card inside the call. It is in beta as of September 2026. Per Telnyx's Voice Payments page:
Three ways to start it. Your app, a TeXML flow, or an AI agent, through the Pay tool on a Telnyx AI Assistant. Telnyx says card digits never enter the model context.
The caller keys the card on the keypad. Telnyx says it keeps the digits out of the recording and the transcript for the whole payment step.
No transfer. Telnyx says the caller stays on the same call, with the same agent. On the TeXML route below, the call stays up and you reconnect the agent yourself.
Up to three tries. If the payment still fails, your flow gets a failed result and decides what happens next.
Cards and ACH debit, in USD.
The captured card goes to a payment connector you configure. Telnyx says that works with any processor you can reach through an HTTPS endpoint, using its generic connector.
Where Shuttle Fits
Shuttle's connector is built for the <Pay> verb in TeXML. When your TeXML flow runs <Pay>, something has to sit at that HTTPS endpoint, take the card, charge your gateway and reply to Telnyx.
If you build that endpoint yourself, the card lands on your servers, and those systems come into PCI scope. That undoes much of the point of keeping the card away from the agent.
On that route, Shuttle is the connector. Shuttle is a PCI DSS Level 1 Service Provider. The card passes through Shuttle's environment on its way to your gateway, and your gateway issues the token. Shuttle stores nothing, and the card never touches your platform.
What that gives an agent builder:
Your own compatible gateway. Shuttle connects to 30+ payment providers that support voice, including Stripe, Adyen, PayPal, Authorize.net, Cybersource and Worldpay Access. Braintree, Square, QuickBooks Payments and Mollie cannot be used for voice payments through Shuttle. For ACH on a call, use Authorize.net: Stripe's ACH runs on a hosted page, so it does not work on a call through Shuttle.
A gateway per client. If you build agents for several businesses, each client runs on its own gateway and merchant account, with its own Telnyx payment connector. The money goes to each client's own account, never through yours.
A fallback when the card is not to hand. Shuttle can create a hosted payment link for you to send by SMS or email, so a caller who cannot find their card can pay after the call.
If your agent will start the payment from the Pay tool on a Telnyx AI Assistant, or from the Voice API, talk to us before you build.
How It Works on the TeXML Route
Your agent reaches the payment step and confirms the amount with the caller.
The assistant conversation ends and your flow takes over. If you set an
actionURL on<Connect>, Telnyx requests it when the assistant conversation ends and runs the TeXML you return.Your TeXML flow takes the payment: it runs
<Pay>, with your Shuttle connector's name inpaymentConnector.The caller keys their card. Telnyx sends it to Shuttle, and Shuttle charges it through your gateway or tokenises it with your gateway.
The result comes back to your flow: the charge or token ID and the last four digits, never the card number.
Your flow reconnects the caller to your assistant and passes it the result and any context it needs. You program that return. Shuttle handles the payment segment of the call, not the whole conversation.
Setup is in two places. In the Shuttle Merchant Portal, the Telnyx Pay Configuration page gives you an endpoint URL and credentials. In the Telnyx portal, you create a payment connector with them. The step-by-step is in our Telnyx payments guide.
PCI for Agent Builders
Shuttle limits your PCI scope. It does not remove it.
Telnyx captures the card and says it keeps it out of the model, recordings and transcripts. The card then passes through Shuttle's PCI DSS Level 1 environment to your gateway, and Shuttle stores nothing. The card never touches your platform. Ask Telnyx for its PCI evidence for the capture step.
Merchants complete SAQ-A, the lightest PCI self-assessment; platforms complete SAQ-D. Everyone taking card payments has to be PCI compliant, and your acquirer confirms which form applies to you. If you build agents that take payments for other businesses, you are a service provider, which means SAQ-D, or a Report on Compliance at Level 1 volumes.
Shuttle's PCI, ISO 27001 and SOC 2 evidence is on the security page.
What It Costs
On Shuttle for Merchants, voice payments cost $49 per live instance per month. An instance is a payment channel, so taking payments by phone is one instance, and adding payment links makes two. Each instance includes 245 Shuttle-billed transactions a month. Transactions on the Telnyx connector are billed by Shuttle, so they count toward the 245. After that, transactions are from $0.20 each, falling with volume. Telnyx bills its own usage separately.
If you are rolling agents out to many clients, talk to us about Shuttle for Platforms, from $2,500 of credit a month, spent on transactions. See pricing.
Telnyx AI Agent Payments FAQ
Can a Telnyx AI agent take card payments? Yes. Telnyx says an AI Assistant can start a payment step with its Pay tool, and that the digits never enter the model context. Shuttle's connector is built for Telnyx's Pay verb in TeXML. If your agent will use the Pay tool, talk to us before you build. Or run the payment step with <Pay> in TeXML, with Shuttle as the connector, as set out in How It Works on the TeXML Route above.
Can the AI agent just listen for the card number? It can, but then your model, transcripts and logs all come into PCI scope. Capture the card outside the conversation, so the agent only gets the outcome.
Is Telnyx Voice Payments PCI compliant? Telnyx describes it as designed for PCI compliance: the card is keyed, encrypted and passed to your payment processor, and never reaches your agent, recording or transcript. Your connector and your own flow still decide your PCI scope.
Does the caller have to leave the call to pay? No. Telnyx runs the payment step on the same call.
Do I need a Twilio account? No. Shuttle's Telnyx connector runs on Telnyx's own Pay verb in TeXML.
Does Shuttle store the card? No. The card passes through Shuttle on its way to your gateway. Your gateway issues the token and keeps it. Shuttle has no vault.
What happens if the payment fails? Telnyx lets the caller try up to three times. After that your flow gets a failed result. Your agent can offer a payment link instead.
What if the caller cannot find their card? Shuttle can create a hosted payment link for you to send by SMS or email, so the caller can pay after the call. Links are a separate channel on Shuttle for Merchants.
Related Reading
Building agents that need to take payments? Talk to us.