Account structure for Platforms Early access
Our Platforms solution is designed to be modular, so there are a number of different resources that can make up your account structure. Use this guide to find out more.
How does it work?
There are currently 2 different account types available on our Platforms solution. Your account type is determined during onboarding and depends on whether you require payment capabilities (lite), or payment and payout capabilities (full).
- Lite: Your sub-entities will undergo card scheme screening (CSS) checks only, and if successful their payment capabilities will be enabled. All funds are settled to your platform as per the frequency agreed during onboarding.
- Full: Your sub-entities will undergo CSS, politically exposed persons (PEP) and sanctions, know your customer (KYC) and know your business (KYB) checks. If successful, their payment and payout capabilities will be enabled. Funds are paid out using our payouts solution from your sub-entity's currency account to the bank account of your sub-entity.
Select the tabs below to find out more.
Key features of the lite account
We do not settle directly with your sub-entities. We settle to you platform's currency account.
Funds from sub-entity payments will be routed and held as per your currency preferences captured during onboarding.
FAQ
When your platform is onboarded with us, we'll ask for your currency preferences. This will include a default currency (e.g. I want all of my payments to be routed to and held in GBP), and possibly some like-for-like preferences (e.g. I specifically want any payments processed in EUR to be routed to and held in EUR).
When you later process a payment on behalf of a sub-entity, we'll route and hold the funds in one of your platform's currency accounts as per your currency preferences. For example, if your default currency is GBP and you have a like-for-like preference of EUR, when you process a payment for a sub-entity in EUR, we'll route and hold funds from this payment to your platform's EUR currency account. If you process a payment for a sub-entity in any other currency, we'll route and hold funds from this payment to your platform's GBP currency account.
All funds will be settled to your platform’s designated bank account(s) as per the frequency agreed during onboarding.
The distribution of funds to your sub-entities and collection of fees for your platform are both done by you.
The solution sends notifications through webhooks. We have documentation that explains how to set up webhooks.
The key webhooks events you need to subscribe to are:
sub_entity_createdmatch_passedmatch_failedvmss_passedvmss_failedpayments_enabledpayments_disabled
Our key terms
There are different resources that make up an account structure – we describe each of them below.
| Resource | Description |
|---|---|
Platform | Within your account, you will have one or more legal entities representing your platform, each having a contractual relationship with Checkout.com. For example, if you have separate legal entities for your European and North American operations, this would be represented by two separate platforms in your account – each with their own configurations. We also describe the tools you use during any step in this process. |
Sub-entity | All vendors, retailers and service providers (often also referred to as "sub-merchants") that sell on your platform are called sub-entities at Checkout.com. A platform can have one or more sub-entities. Sub-entities can be:
Sub-entities are onboarded by your platform via the Accounts API! |
Representative | Sub-entities that are companies will have – what we call – representatives. Representatives are shareholders or ultimate beneficial owners (UBOs) who own ≥25% of the company or voting rights. If there are no UBOs who own ≥25% of the company, the representative(s) should be an individual with the right to sign on behalf of the company. We require information about these representatives during onboarding. |
Currency account | A container of funds, enabling the receiving and holding of funds in a designated currency, similar to a digital wallet. |
Payment instrument | A set of bank account details securely stored in our vault, which can later be used as a destination when making payouts. |
Processing channel | A processing channel is a container of settings that enable you to process payments for a particular industry. Industries are classified by merchant category codes (MCCs). A processing channel is required for each MCC you wish to process payments under for your sub-entities. It must be supplied when making payment requests. |
Next steps
About onboarding sub-entities
Find out more about onboarding and verification for your sub-entities.