Payments Marketplace Payments Marketplace
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The Rules of the Marketplace

How Matching Works — for Every Side

Payments Marketplace sits between Merchants and Payment Service Providers, and an ISO can place a Merchant across the same rails. Every rule here binds all three, so each one is stated three times: what it means if you're applying, what it means if you're underwriting, and what it means if you're placing someone else's business.

1

The Merchant's identity is withheld until a provider accepts

If you're a Merchant
Your company name, website, email and documents stay with Payments Marketplace. A provider assesses your business — industry, volume, average transaction value, countries, chargeback history — not your brand. Nothing identifying reaches them, including in the website scan summary.
If you're a Provider
You underwrite on verified business facts rather than a name you might already have an opinion about. The Merchant's identity and contact details are released the moment you accept, together with the introduction email.
If you're an ISO
The Merchant you place is anonymous on the same terms — but the timing is yours. You can name them when you submit, or leave them withheld until a provider accepts. Your own organisation is always named on the deal, deliberately: a provider's appetite depends partly on who is introducing.
2

One live application per provider, at a time

If you're a Merchant
While an application is under review, there is nothing further to send to that provider. Your results page shows its state — Awaiting review, Returned, Accepted — instead of a Send button.
If you're a Provider
No duplicates in your deals desk. One Merchant means one open application, so nothing is reviewed twice and nothing is charged twice.
If you're an ISO
The volume caps that pace an individual applicant don't apply to you, but this one does. One of your Merchants means one open application at that provider until they decide — and it binds per Merchant, so the rest of your book moves independently.
3

A decline is final — only the provider can reopen it

If you're a Merchant
If a provider reviews your profile and declines, you cannot reapply to them — not after changes, and not after time has passed. That provider stays closed unless they choose to re-invite you.
If you're a Provider
Your decision sticks. You will never see the same Merchant resubmit to you uninvited. If your appetite changes, Re-invite from the deals desk reopens that Merchant — and only you can do it.
If you're an ISO
A provider that declines a Merchant you introduced is closed to that Merchant. Resubmitting them under a fresh profile is not a route around it, and neither is placing them again yourself. Only that provider's re-invite reopens it, and it lands in your onboarding mailbox rather than your client's.
4

An acceptance ends the matching

If you're a Merchant
When a provider accepts, you are introduced by email and the two of you carry on directly. There is nothing further to submit through Payments Marketplace to that provider.
If you're a Provider
Acceptance is the billable event and it happens once. The deal fee is fixed at the rate that applied when the deal was created, so later repricing never changes what a historical deal cost.
If you're an ISO
The introduction goes to the mailbox you nominate, never to your Merchant, and the provider's desk carries a note asking them to correspond with you. Acceptance is also the billable event on your side: the fee charged is the one fixed when you submitted.
5

Applications that can't work are never sent

If you're a Merchant
You can't apply to a provider who doesn't board your industry or country, or who can't cover your settlement currency, target regions or required payment methods. The results page marks them Blocked or Poor match and tells you which requirement failed.
If you're a Provider
Your published parameters do the filtering before anything reaches you. Applications that fail your hard rules, or that you couldn't service if you wanted to, never arrive in your desk at all.
If you're an ISO
You see the fit before you commit to anyone. A placement that can't work shows as Blocked or Poor match in the Pre-Flight Check, rather than as a decline three days later that costs you standing with that desk.
6

Underwriting criteria are never exposed

If you're a Merchant
You see whether you fit and what to fix — never a provider's internal thresholds. Payments Marketplace tells you the outcome and the gap, not the rulebook behind it.
If you're a Provider
Your acceptance parameters stay yours. They are used to score and to filter, and are never shown, exported or inferable from a Merchant's results.
If you're an ISO
You see exactly what your Merchant would — whether they fit and what stands in the way — and no more. Placing a book of Merchants doesn't accumulate into a picture of anyone's rulebook.
7

Free for Merchants — one deal fee, paid by whoever brought the deal

If you're a Merchant
The pre-flight check and every application are free. Payments Marketplace never charges you, takes no commission, and takes no share of what you later process.
If you're a Provider
A single deal fee in EUR, on accepted deals only — and only on deals a Merchant sent you themselves. A deal introduced by an ISO is billed to them and arrives marked that way. Declined and returned applications cost nothing, and there are no subscriptions or minimums — see the fee schedule.
If you're an ISO
On a deal you introduce, the fee is yours and the provider is not billed at all — you already have terms with them, and charging them again would mean paying twice for one introduction. Same schedule and same trigger: 80–125 EUR, fixed at submission, on acceptance only.
Fair Use

Deliberate applications, not scattergun ones

Payments Marketplace is built for considered approaches. These limits apply to every Merchant applying for themselves, and they are the reason a provider can treat what lands in their desk as intentional. The daily allowance is sized so a small set of complementary providers can be approached in one sitting; the 30-day cap is what keeps applications deliberate.

3applications per 24 hours
6applications per 30 days
3applications per pre-flight session
1live application per provider

Pre-flight checks are also capped per session to prevent automated probing of provider criteria. Re-submitting an application a provider has Returned to you doesn't count against these limits — that exchange is one they asked for.

ISOs are not capped on volume. An ISO submits for a whole book of Merchants from one account, so the counts above would stop it well short of its client list — and these caps exist to slow anonymous probing, which an authenticated, billable account isn't. What still binds an ISO is one live application per provider per Merchant, and a decline being final: those are integrity rules, not throttles. Website scans stay capped per sitting on every route in.

Where these rules sit

This page describes how the platform behaves. It is not a substitute for the Terms & Conditions, which govern your use of Payments Marketplace, or the Privacy Policy, which covers what we hold and why. Where a rule here touches your data — anonymity in particular — the Privacy Policy is the fuller statement.

Something here not matching what you're seeing? Tell us at connect@payments-marketplace.com.