As a Merchant of Record (MoR), we act as the reseller of digital goods and services. Therefore, we need to make sure that businesses using Polar complies with our acceptable products & use policies. Combined with continuously monitoring, reviewing and preventing fraud, unacceptable use, bad actors and high risk accounts.

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First payout review (24-48h)

You will need to go through our main review ahead of the initial payout. We’ll reach out over email within 24h (often faster) with:
  1. A quick survey about your business, products and intended use case with Polar
  2. Identity verification (KYC) using passport (or drivers license) and selfie. It’s secure, easy and quick to submit using Stripe Identity.
We need to perform this review to ensure compliance with our acceptable products & use policy. Combined with meeting our own KYC/AML requirements as a billing platform. Submit upfront (Soon) We’ll soon offer the ability to submit all of this information in advance to speed up the initial payout even further and without concern of any issues or delays.

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Continuous reviews (Async)

We continuously monitor all transactions across our platform to proactively prevent fraud. In addition to performing asynchronous reviews of accounts at certain sale thresholds. These reviews are often completed within hours and without any additional information required from you. You’ll get notified over email that a review is taking place. Payouts will be paused during this time, but it has no impact on your customers’ experience or ability to purchase, subscribe or checkout at any time. We look at:
  • Risk scores across historic transactions
  • Refund- & Chargeback ratio
  • Appropriate next sales threshold for a review given the above
High chargeback ratios Credit card networks, e.g Visa/Mastercard, consider 0.7% of sales in chargebacks excessive. Exceeding it can lead to monitoring programs with high costs, penalties and ultimately termination. We therefore reach out proactively to collaborate on maintaining a low chargeback ratio and reducing it ahead of getting close to these thresholds.

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Operational Guidelines

To maintain platform integrity and ensure smooth operations, we have established clear guidelines for merchants using Polar.

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Expected Responsiveness

We expect merchants to maintain high standards of customer support and responsiveness:
  • Support Ticket Management: Maintain a low rate of support tickets from end-users
  • Merchant Communication: When we include you in customer support communications, we require a response within 48 hours
    • If no response is received within 48 hours, we will issue a warning
    • If no response is received within 24 hours of the warning, we may issue refunds to affected customers
  • Customer Service Quality: We evaluate your customer service history and approach when determining appropriate actions

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Test Transactions

To maintain platform security and prevent abuse:
  • Use Sandbox Environment or 100% Discounts: All testing must be conducted using our sandbox environment. Want to test in production? Use a Free Product or a 100% Discount code to avoid using real money.
  • No Real Money Testing: Any such transactions are prohibited and will be refunded. It’s against the terms of payment service providers, triggers our account reviews and can potentially lead to the card or account getting blocked since it can be flagged as “card testing”.

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Chargeback Management

We monitor chargeback rates closely to protect both merchants and customers:
  • Acceptable Threshold: We maintain a chargeback rate threshold of 0.4% for merchants
  • Timeframe: Chargebacks can be filed up to 120 days from the original transaction date
  • Consequences of High Chargeback Rates: We work proactively to maintain a low chargeback rate throughout the platform and strive to collaborate with merchants at risk of exceeding our thresholds to reverse the trend. However, we reserve the right to (in order of severity):
    • Refund transactions as needed
    • Pause payouts pending review – up until the timeframe for chargebacks have been surpassed
    • Pause future payments
    • Block accounts and refund customers
    We don’t take this responsibility or actions lightly, and always strive to mitigate and avoid them, but have to take appropriate and proactive actions in case of issues.
    We also have integrations with credit card networks to receive early chargeback signals before they’re officially filed. We automatically refund such transactions under a certain value and cancel any subscriptions associated with the customer to reduce chargebacks proactively.

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Policy Violations

For merchants who violate our acceptable use policies (and don’t have high chargeback rates):
  • Immediate Action: We will offboard merchants who violate our policies
  • Payment Processing: All payment processing will be blocked
  • Payout Management: Payouts will be paused pending review
  • Resolution Process:
    • We may conduct test transactions to verify account status
    • In case of strong suspicion of fraud or intentional abuse, we block the account immediately
    • We reach out merchants about the issue and give them 48 hours to respond
      • Failure to respond may result in refunds to affected customers
    • We pause future payments in the meantime if deemed necessary
    • We pause payouts during the resolution process
    • We strive to collaborate with merchants on the best possible path forward. Clear fraud or abuse, however, is immediately blocked.
    • We have to cancel subscriptions and refund payments made in violation of our acceptable use policies for compliance and risk, and strive to do so in collaboration with the merchant.