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Merchants

Merchants

Swan account holders who have been approved to accept payments from their customers using Swan.

Use Swan to help your merchants accept payments with supported payment methods.

Pending review

Before accepting payments, you and your merchant need to complete a risk review. To get started, contact your dedicated Technical Account Manager, or send an email to integration@swan.io.

Merchant profiles​

A merchant profile is a collection of business, risk, and support information that fulfils two primary requirements: approve the account holder as a merchant, and facilitate accepting payments with Swan.

The merchant profile contains the following information:

  • Business details
  • Description of the business activity
  • Link to the merchant's website
  • Projected volumes
  • Support phone number
  • Logo (optional), displayed online and on mandate PDFs

You can request a profile update with the API mutation requestMerchantProfileUpdate, and merchants can request an update through your web banking interface. You can request an update to the merchant's name, website, product type, expected monthly payment volume, expected average basket, and logo.

A merchant profile is required of all Swan account holders wanting to accept payments from customers. If you want to collect payments from customers, you must have at least one merchant profile.

The merchant profile is created with the status PendingReview, and the profile is visible right away on your Dashboard.

Risk and merchant profiles​

All merchant profiles are reviewed by Swan. We might contact you for more information before accepting or rejecting the new merchant profile.

  • Swan changes the status for accepted merchant profiles from PendingReview to Enabled.
  • Swan changes the status of unaccepted profiles to Rejected. The decision is final and cannot be challenged.
  • Swan might suspend or cancel a merchant profile.
    • There are various situations that can lead to the suspension or cancellation of a merchant profile, the most notable being risk-related, such as fraud.
  • Merchant profiles with the status Suspended can't be used.
  • The status Canceled, like the status Rejected, is final.

Profile statuses​

Final status
Can use profile
Canceled
Rejected
Enabled
Profile
requested
PendingReview
Suspended

Payment methods​

Your merchants can accept payments from their clients using any of several merchant payment methods.

Merchant payment methods are connected to a merchant profile, and a single merchant profile can have multiple payment methods. To accept payments with Swan, there must be an Enabled merchant profile and at least one Enabled merchant payment method.

To learn about requesting payment methods, refer to the request payment method guides for SEPA Direct Debit, Internal Direct Debit, and French checks. You could also request multiple methods in one API call.

Available payment methods​

Your merchants can use the following payment methods to accept payments with Swan:

Versions and statuses​

Swan creates a new version of your payment method every time a change is requested. Only one version of a payment method can have the status Enabled.

Similarly, only one version of a payment method can have the status PendingReview. However, the statuses Disabled, Canceled, and Rejected can be assigned to unlimited versions of each payment method.

Swan manages the statuses for Enabled or PendingReview payment methods automatically. Therefore, you don't need to change the status before calling the API.

Risk and payment methods​

All payment methods are reviewed by Swan. We might contact you for more information before accepting or rejecting the payment method.

  • Swan might change a payment method status to Suspended if an API request is made that conflicts with status and versioning rules.
  • After completing a review of an existing payment method, Swan can reinstate the payment method by changing the status back to to Enabled.
  • Swan changes the status from PendingReview or Suspended to Rejected when the payment method is rejected or no longer acceptable.

Payment method statuses​

Final status
Can use method
Canceled
Rejected
Enabled
Merchant payment
method requested
PendingReview
Disabled

Rolling reserve​

Rolling reserve is a policy Swan applies to merchant transactions to protect the merchant and Swan against various risk factors, primarily insufficient funds and attempted fraud. The reserved amount acts as a safety net to cover potential loss for both Swan and the merchant.

Rolling reserve is expressed as a percentage over a period of time (example: 10% of the payment amount over 30 business days), and applies to most payment methods used by merchants to accept payments with Swan.

For the indicated period of time, the amount isn't part of the merchant's available account balance, after which the funds are released to the merchant and can be used.

Rolling reserve is held in a non-interest bearing reserve for transparency between Swan and merchants, therefore reducing the risk of a conflict of interest between the two parties.

Payment methodRolling reserveDefault amount
Internal Direct Debit - Standard✓ YesDetermined by a merchant profile risk assessment
Internal Direct Debit - B2B☒ Non/a
SEPA Direct Debit - Core✓ Yes15% over 15 business days
SEPA Direct Debit - B2B✓ Yes100% over 3 business days
French checks✓ Yes100% over 10 interbank business days

Guides​