# customer

###### The customer element contains customer master data, contacts, addresses and bank account data.

↔ Request/Response parameter

## `<customer>`

### Request

| Type | Condition | Restriction |
|  --- | --- | --- |
| customerType | Mandatory | Mandatory for:- `PAYMENT_REQUEST`Optional for:- `PAYMENT_CHANGE`N/A for:- all other operations |


### Response

| Type | Condition | Restriction |
|  --- | --- | --- |
| customerType | Mandatory | Mandatory for- response-type`PAYMENT_PERMISSION`N/A for:- all other cases |


## Different handling of B2C and B2B customers

For private customers (B2C) the elements [`first-name`](/docs/developer/api_integration/payment_1.8/payment_api_documentation/api_explorer/content/customer/first-name), [`last-name`](/docs/developer/api_integration/payment_1.8/payment_api_documentation/api_explorer/content/customer/last-name), [`phone`](/docs/developer/api_integration/payment_1.8/payment_api_documentation/api_explorer/content/customer/contacts/phone) and [`date-of-birth`](/docs/developer/api_integration/payment_1.8/payment_api_documentation/api_explorer/content/customer/date-of-birth) are mandatory.

If [`company-name`](/docs/developer/api_integration/payment_1.8/payment_api_documentation/api_explorer/content/customer/company-name) is filled, the customer has to be considered as company (B2B). In this case the use of the optional elements [`vat-id`](/docs/developer/api_integration/payment_1.8/payment_api_documentation/api_explorer/content/customer/vat-id), [`company-id`](/docs/developer/api_integration/payment_1.8/payment_api_documentation/api_explorer/content/customer/company-id), [`registry-location`](/docs/developer/api_integration/payment_1.8/payment_api_documentation/api_explorer/content/customer/registry-location), [`company-type`](/docs/developer/api_integration/payment_1.8/payment_api_documentation/api_explorer/content/customer/company-type) and [`homepage`](/docs/developer/api_integration/payment_1.8/payment_api_documentation/api_explorer/content/customer/homepage) help identifying the company. This can increase the acceptance rate.