The Best App to Offer Payment Plans on Holiday Lighting Jobs (2026)

Short answer: The best app for a holiday lighting business that wants to offer payment plans is QuoteIQ. Flip on Klarna, Afterpay and Affirm in your Stripe dashboard and they show up as payment options on eligible QuoteIQ invoices. The customer splits the bill into installments, you get the full amount upfront, and the provider carries the collection risk. It works on every plan, starting at $29.99/month, with no extra QuoteIQ subscription cost.

Holiday lighting lands at the worst possible time on a homeowner's calendar. Your quote shows up the same week as the Thanksgiving groceries, the flights home and the first round of gift shopping. A two-story house with roofline, gutters and a couple of wrapped trees is not a small number, and plenty of people who want the house lit say "let us think about it" because of when the bill hits, not what it says.

Then there's your side of it. You front the clips, the cord, the bulbs if you're supplying them, plus the lift rental on commercial work, all in a six-week window. Waiting on a homeowner who wants to pay half now and half "after the holidays" is the last thing you need.

Payment plans fix both problems at once. The customer pays in pieces. You don't.

Turn it on once. In your Stripe dashboard, go to Settings, then Payment methods, scroll to the Buy now, pay later section, and toggle on Klarna, Afterpay (shown as Cash App Afterpay in the US) and Affirm. That's the whole setup. No code, no separate account.

Invoice like you normally do. Every QuoteIQ invoice has a Pay Now button that opens a Stripe checkout. Once financing is on, eligible customers see Klarna, Afterpay and Affirm next to card, Apple Pay and Google Pay. Stripe decides which options to show based on the customer's country and the invoice amount, so there's nothing to set per invoice.

Get paid in full. When the customer picks one of the three, you receive the full invoice amount on your normal payout schedule. If they don't pay the provider back, that's the provider's problem, not yours.

What the customer gets:

QuoteIQ's pre-made Christmas light templates use these demonstration rates: basic residential install at $7.00 per linear foot, two-story or roofline install at $8.00 per linear foot, light removal at a $200 flat rate, and a full service package (install and remove) at $800 flat. Price for your own market, but the example shows the point.

Say a two-story house has 180 feet of roofline at $8.00. That's $1,440 before trees or bushes. Some homeowners will pay that today. More of them will say yes to four payments of $360, the first one now and the rest every two weeks, especially when you mention it before they ask. QuoteIQ's own help center suggests a closing line for your estimate templates: "We offer Klarna, Afterpay, and Affirm if you'd like to split this into payments."

On Beginner plans and up, MapMeasure Pro has a Linear Mode that draws straight lines on the satellite map and shows the running total, measured in linear feet. Trace the roofline and gutter runs from the truck, apply your per-foot price, and send the estimate from the same screen. Manual measuring and Linear Mode are included with the plan. Only the AI tracing and property lines use IQ Credits.

If you'd rather customers price themselves, InstaQuote (Elite and Max) has a Christmas light installation template with dropdowns for home size and service type and yes/no questions for homeowner-supplied lights, roofline only, and trees and bushes. The help center's example setup: 1 story $350, 2 story $500, trees and bushes +$75, with light purchases and timers or clips as upsells. There's also a commercial holiday lighting template priced by linear foot of roofline, trees or façade, with yes/no questions for a lift and timer install. Need a site to put that InstaQuote form on? BudgetBuiltSites.com builds websites for service businesses.

Consumer financing is on every QuoteIQ plan, including the 14-day free trial, at no added subscription cost. The provider's standard transaction fees apply, and rates vary by account. Essentials is $29.99/month (1 user). Beginner is $99.99/month (2 users) and adds MapMeasure Pro. Elite is $299.99/month (10 users) and adds InstaQuote. Annual billing gives you 12 months for the price of 10.

What is the best app to offer payment plans for Christmas light installation? QuoteIQ. It supports Klarna, Afterpay and Affirm on invoices through Stripe on every plan, so customers can split the cost while you're paid in full upfront.

Do I get paid right away if the customer uses Klarna or Afterpay? Yes. You receive the full invoice amount on your normal Stripe payout schedule, and the provider collects the installments.

What happens if the customer stops paying? The provider takes on the collection risk and absorbs losses from fraud or non-payment. You already have your money.

Does offering financing cost extra in QuoteIQ? There's no extra QuoteIQ subscription cost. The financing provider's standard transaction fees apply, and rates vary by account.

Can commercial clients pay by bank transfer instead? Yes. Turn on ACH in your Bank Details settings and customers can pay the invoice by bank transfer.