KYC / KYB onboarding

Before VINR can move money on your behalf, regulation requires us to know who you are and who controls your business. This page explains what we collect, why, and how an account progresses from sign-up to fully verified. This page is informational and not legal advice; consult your compliance counsel for binding decisions.

Why verification is requiredAskCopy

VINR settles funds to your bank account, which makes us a regulated payment intermediary. As part of that role we are obligated to perform Know Your Customer (KYC) on the individuals who own or control an account, and Know Your Business (KYB) on the legal entity itself. These checks deter money laundering, sanctions evasion, and fraud, and they are a precondition for enabling live payouts.

In practice, verification protects you too: a verified account settles faster, faces fewer payout holds, and is far less likely to be flagged by acquiring banks or card networks during routine reviews.

Information you'll provideAskCopy

What we ask for depends on your entity type and country. A typical company onboarding collects three groups of data.

You'll also provide a payout bank account and a short description of what you sell so we can map you to the correct Merchant Category Code and flag restricted activity early.

Verification statesAskCopy

Every account carries a verification status you can read via the API and react to with webhooks. Build your onboarding UI against these states rather than guessing.

Fetch the current status and the list of outstanding requirements at any time:

import { Vinr } from '@vinr/sdk';
const vinr = new Vinr({ secretKey: process.env.VINR_SECRET_KEY });

const account = await vinr.accounts.retrieve();

console.log(account.verification.status);          // "needs_input"
for (const req of account.verification.requirements) {
  // e.g. { field: "representative.id_document", reason: "blurry_image" }
  console.log(`${req.field}: ${req.reason}`);
}

Drive your dashboard from the account.updated event instead of polling:

export async function POST(req: Request) {
  const payload = await req.text();
  const signature = req.headers.get('x-vinr-signature')!;
  const event = vinr.webhooks.verify(payload, signature);

  if (event.type === 'account.updated') {
    const status = event.data.verification.status;
    if (status === 'needs_input') notifyMerchant(event.data.verification.requirements);
    if (status === 'verified') enableLivePayments();
  }
  return new Response('ok', { status: 200 });
}

Ongoing due diligenceAskCopy

Verification is not a one-time gate. We re-screen accounts on an ongoing basis and may request fresh information when circumstances change.

Restricted businessesAskCopy

Some activities cannot be supported, or require extra review, regardless of how clean the verification is. Common categories include:

• Unlicensed financial services, money transmission, or virtual currency exchange
• Gambling, lotteries, and games of chance without the required licenses
• Adult content, weapons, and regulated drugs or paraphernalia
• Multi-level marketing, pseudo-pharmaceuticals, and other high-chargeback models

This list is illustrative, not exhaustive, and varies by region and acquiring bank. Confirm your specific use case with VINR support and your own compliance counsel before going live.

Next stepsAskCopy