As required by payment industry regulations, Adyen must verify the users in your platform before you can process payments, pay out their funds, and offer financial products to them. These verification checks are also called Know Your Customer (KYC) checks.
During this process, Adyen verifies that your users provide accurate information about their businesses. Based on the results of the KYC checks, Adyen decides if a user can perform any action on your platform. These actions are known as capabilities .
To see whether a user can use a specific capability on your platform, check the capability settings.
On this page, we describe:
When does Adyen verify users
Adyen verifies users before allowing them to use capabilities on your platform. The following are the events that trigger verification checks.
When you request capabilities for your user
In the design phase, you set the default capabilities for your platform. These capabilities are requested every time you onboard a new user and create an account holder for them. Adyen verifies the user and if they successfully complete the verification checks, they are allowed to use the capabilities.
If a user needs a specific capability that is not requested by default, you must request the additional capability. In some cases, this requires more verification.
When users change their data
When users change their data after they are already allowed to use capabilities, Adyen verifies them again.
In case the updated data fails verification, Adyen might set a deadline by which the user should resolve the issues. They are allowed to continue using the capabilities while the deadline is active.
If the user does not resolve the verification issues in a timely manner, their capabilities will be disallowed.
When users move to a higher tier (staggered verification)
In a staggered verification, you collect data from the user based on their tier. When a user moves to a higher tier, the capabilities related to paying out are disallowed. For the capabilities related to accepting payments, Adyen might add a deadline by which the user must provide additional required data. They are still allowed to use capabilities related to accepting payments while the deadline is in place.
If the user does not take action in a timely manner, the remaining capabilities will be disallowed.
Verification deadlines
For events that are triggered after users are already allowed to use capabilities, Adyen may set a deadline to give them enough time to resolve verification issues. Verification deadlines are a new feature only available in v3 of the Legal Entity Management API.
Users are allowed to continue using the capabilities while the deadline is active. To get the verification deadlines, make a GET /accountHolders/id request.
The diagrams in the next section show the process and the corresponding verification statuses and capability settings.
How the verification process works
In the following diagrams, you can see the process for events that trigger verification checks and the relationship between verification statuses and capability settings.
The illustrated verification process is as follows:
- You create an account holder or request new capabilities for your user.
- Adyen asynchronously checks if there are verification requirements that your user must fulfill.
- If the verification fails, user can fix the issues by providing new or updated data.
If the verification is successful, the user is allowed to use the capability.
Adyen sends all verification-related updates through webhooks. If Adyen has verified the information but found reasons to not allow the capability, the verification status will be rejected and the capability will not be allowed.
Verification statuses
To get updates about the status of the verification checks, you can:
- Listen to balancePlatform.accountHolder.created and balancePlatform.accountHolder.updated webhooks
- Make a GET /accountHolders/{id} request
The possible values of the verification status are as follows:
Verification status |
Description |
|---|---|
pending |
The pending status indicates that the verification is in progress. At this verification phase, a capability requested for the first time is set to
requested
: true and
allowed
: false. If the capability has already been allowed, but some user data has changed and needs to be verified, you may see that the verification status is pending and the capability is
allowed
: true. This means that the user is still allowed to use capability while Adyen performs the checks. |
valid |
The valid status indicates that the verification is successfully completed and that the user meets the requirements to use a capability. With this verification status, the user can use the capability. Adyen sets the capability to
allowed
: true. |
invalid |
The invalid status indicates that the verification failed, for example due to incorrect information or missing documents. In this case, the webhook or the API response contains the problems object, including the verificationErrors, subErrors, and remediatingActions arrays returned on the linked legal entity. If there are verification errors, you must resolve them. With this verification status, Adyen sets the capability to
allowed
: false. This means the user is not permitted to use the capability until all verification errors are resolved and the verification process is completed successfully. If any user data changes or is missing after the previous verification has been completed successfully, Adyen reverts the verification status to invalid. In such a scenario, the user must provide the necessary information within a specific deadline. During this period, the user can continue using the capability, and its setting remains as
allowed
: true. |
rejected |
The rejected status indicates that Adyen completed verification, but the user does not meet the requirements to use a capability based on the submitted information. This status is final and any errors cannot be resolved by updating data or uploading documents. With this verification status, Adyen prohibits the user from performing the action and sets the capability to
allowed
: false. |