Real-time review
When a transaction comes in, it is compared with the merchant's profile and historical data, and any change in behavior is detected the day it begins, not at the next annual review.
Fraud · Acquiring
Merchant Monitoring
Deciding to approve a merchant is one thing; the risk comes afterward. Each merchant in your portfolio is checked every day and on each transaction against the details of their business, their profile, and their own past history, so that you can take action before chargebacks and fines affect you.
Complete
Every merchant, every transaction
Instant
Checked at transaction time and daily
Actionable
Hold, review or escalate from the alert
Preventive
Stopped before the chargeback lands
Why this matters
You approved the merchant once. You carry its risk every day after.
A merchant that passed onboarding can change without notifying you; ownership may transfer, the business model may change, a product line may appear outside the declared MCC, or the account may start making payments on someone else's behalf. A periodic review examines the merchant as a profile and thus fails to pick up what its transactions are indicating. Connected flows and slow changes in volume and patterns that develop over weeks only become apparent when every merchant is monitored on a schedule and on each transaction.
Action at the alert
Hold settlement, open a case, or schedule a review from the screen where the alert appears. The decision, together with the reason for it, is recorded at the same time.
Nothing changes unseen
Every change to a merchant's profile, including changes to their signals and risk score, is recorded. If a change results in an increased risk level, your team will receive an alert together with the evidence.
How it works
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Four steps, from portfolio to action
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Step 01
Ingest the portfolio
Upload your merchant portfolio with each merchant's declared business, MCC, ownership, and expected volumes. Connect transaction and settlement flows by API or by file. From that point on, every merchant is measured against what it declared at onboarding and against its own track record.
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Step 02
Monitor the changes
The chargeback rates, changes in volume, discrepancies relating to MCC, and settlement patterns are evaluated for each merchant every day as transactions are received, and any changes you make to the profile data, such as giving the business a new owner or assigning it a new settlement account, are also detected and cause a recalculation to take place.
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Step 03
Detect laundering and drift
If the pattern indicates transaction laundering or that the merchant is selling outside the category it declared, a flag is generated. The flag lists the signals and rules that triggered it and includes the exposure, so the team can see the extent of the issue before investigating.
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Step 04
Act on the merchant
Hold settlement, open a case or schedule a review directly from the alert. Each action will be recorded together with the user, the time and a reason code, so that the decision can be explained to a card scheme, an auditor or the merchant itself.
complead / ingest
- merchants loaded4,120
- flows livelive
- M-2291Electronics retail
complead / watch
- chargebacks, M-22914x
- MCCmismatch
- offshoresettlement
complead / detect
- transaction launderingsuspected
- exposure€1.2M
- riskHIGH
complead / act
- settlementheld
- caseopened
- reviewscheduled
Ingest
Monitor
Detect
Act
Capabilities
What the product actually does
Portfolio monitoring
All the merchants in the portfolio are constantly assessed, not just when their reviews are due; those that are low risk remain at the bottom, the high-risk ones move to the top, and the score changes when the merchant's behavior changes.
Chargeback and volume signals
The merchant's chargeback figures, any sudden increases in volume, and any changes in its transaction patterns are assessed by referring to its own history, and a merchant that doubles its volume overnight is treated as if it did so that same night, not at the end of the month.
Transaction laundering detection
Merchants will process payments on behalf of another business using their own account, and discrepancies in categories, unexpected counterparties, and volume patterns that don't match the stated business are considered together, not individually.
Category drift
Merchants are flagged when their transactions no longer match the MCC they have declared. For example, a merchant registered as an electronics retailer that begins processing transactions similar to a gambling or crypto business is identified before the scheme does.
Exposure view
Each alert includes the merchant's value at risk and trend information; the team addresses the alert with the largest exposure before attending to the oldest one in the queue.
Settlement action
You can choose to hold or to release the settlement from the platform. Every hold and release carries a reason code along with the name of the user who carried it out, the action being recorded in the audit trail.
Product tour
Three screens, from the whole portfolio to a single decision
The whole portfolio, monitored and scored
All merchants with a live risk score appear, along with the signals that trigger it.
- Live risk score per merchant
- Signals on each row
- Exposure per merchant
- Daily and transaction-time scoring
complead / portfolio
- M-2291HIGH
- M-1180MEDIUM
- M-0904LOW
Every alert, with the reason behind it
The rules that caused the reaction, the signals that underlie the score, and the merchant's movements over time.
- Triggered rules
- Signal breakdown
- Exposure and trend
- Settlement status
complead / merchant-detail
- rules triggeredchargeback spike
- MCCmismatch
- offshoresettlement
- launderingsuspected
What was done, and by whom
Details of each hold, case, and review regarding the user, including the time and result.
- Action log per merchant
- User and timestamp of each action
- Reason code on every decision
- Outcome captured
complead / actions
- M-2291 settlement held by Fraud Expert14:20
- caseopened
- reviewscheduled
Integration
Stream merchant flows in, get risk alerts out
You can send merchant profiles and transaction flows via API, either in real time or by using a file, and merchant risk alerts and settlement holds will be returned to your own systems as webhook events.
// send a merchant transaction flow
POST /v1/merchants/flows
"merchant_id": "M-2291", "volume_24h": 1200000, "chargeback_rate": 0.041
0.041 200 OK · scored · risk HIGH
// subscribe to merchant risk alerts
PUT /v1/merchants/webhooks
"events": ["merchant.flagged", "settlement.hold"], "url": "https://you.example/merchant-alert"
FAQ
Before you ask us
What is transaction laundering, and can you detect it?
It is when a merchant processes payments for another business through its own account. complead reads category mismatches, unexpected counterparties, and volume patterns that don’t fit the stated business together, so it’s the combination that raises the flag, not any single signal.
Is the whole portfolio monitored, or only merchants due for review?
The whole portfolio, continuously. Every merchant is scored daily and at transaction time, so a low-risk merchant whose behavior changes moves up the queue the same day instead of waiting for its next periodic review.
What signals drive a merchant flag?
Chargeback trend, volume shifts, category drift, and settlement patterns, each measured against the merchant’s own history. A spike is judged against what is normal for that merchant, not against one threshold for the whole portfolio.
How quickly is a sudden jump in volume picked up?
On the day it happens. A merchant that doubles its volume overnight is flagged that night, not when the month-end report runs.
What is category drift?
It is when a merchant’s transactions no longer match the MCC it declared. A merchant registered as an electronics retailer that starts processing gambling- or crypto-like payments is flagged before the scheme notices it.
Do alerts show the exposure?
Yes. Every alert carries the merchant’s value at risk and its trend, so the team works the largest exposure first rather than the oldest item in the queue.
Can we hold, review or escalate straight from the alert?
Yes. The alert is where the team acts: a merchant can be put on settlement hold, sent for review, or escalated without switching tools. Each action's outcome is captured on the merchant’s record.
How do merchant data and transactions reach complead?
Merchant profiles and transaction flows are sent via API, in real time or as a file. Merchant risk alerts and settlement holds come back to your endpoint as webhooks.
How does this relate to merchant onboarding and payment fraud?
Onboarding decides whether a merchant is approved, and KYB & UBO Verification covers that step. Merchant Monitoring watches what the merchant does after approval. Payment Fraud scores individual payments at authorization, while Merchant Monitoring tracks the merchant’s behavior across the entire flow.
Can we see why a merchant was flagged?
Yes. The merchant detail view shows the triggered rules, the breakdown of signals behind the score, exposure and trend, and the current settlement status. An analyst sees the reasoning, not just the score.
Testimonials
All case studies
What compliance teams say
complead provides ultimate control via its case management and safelist systems. Automated API operations significantly reduced my team's manual workload.
Using the API we run AML controls automatically and stay compliant, while reducing our team's daily workload.
With complead we offer fast, easy, secure onboarding. We focus on real risks, not false positives.
Score your own merchants
Send us a sample of your merchant flows; during a 30-minute session, we will score them and indicate which merchants rise to the top and which signals cause each flag to be triggered.
3,000+
Data sources checked
220+
Countries covered
15 min
Always real-time data