• A payment facilitator processes payments for other businesses under its own acquirer contract, so a sub-merchant accepts cards without negotiating its own agreement with a bank.

  • Register with a sponsoring acquirer and reach PCI DSS Level 1. Obtain the licenses your model needs: a Money Transmitter License in the US, a PI or EMI license in Europe. Then build the platform, connect to the acquirer, and run merchant management yourself.

  • Square, Stripe, Adyen and PayPal. Each processes under its own acquirer contract and carries underwriting and compliance for the businesses on top of it.

  • It depends on the acquirer, the licenses your model needs, and how fast you can build. The payfac we built for a US startup reached production in under twelve months.

  • Who carries compliance and risk. A processor leaves each business to handle its own. A payment facilitator takes on underwriting, risk assessment and the compliance of every sub-merchant it signs.