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Payments glossary

Payments come with a lot of jargon. Here are plain-language definitions of the terms you'll come across in MONEI, with a link to learn more about each one.

3D Secure / SCA

An extra authentication step for card payments (Strong Customer Authentication under PSD2) that helps reduce fraud and shifts chargeback liability for fraudulent transactions.

Acquirer (acquiring bank)

The bank that holds your merchant account and receives the funds from card payments. For most MONEI merchants, MONEI handles acquiring for you.

API key

The secret credential that authenticates your server with the MONEI API. You have separate test-mode and live-mode keys.

Asynchronous payment

A payment that isn’t completed at checkout. The customer gets a reference or request and pays later — at an ATM, in their banking app, or in a shop. The order isn’t confirmed until the funds actually arrive, which can take minutes to days.

Authorization

Reserving the funds for a payment without taking them yet. You capture them later to complete the charge, or the hold is released.

BACS

The UK’s main bank-to-bank scheme for transfers and direct debits between UK accounts. Only relevant if you receive GBP settlements through a bank that uses the BACS network.

BIN (card prefix)

The first 6–8 digits of a card number (Bank Identification Number, also called IIN). They identify the issuing bank, card type, and country, and are used as a signal in fraud checks.

Bizum online

MONEI's online Bizum: the customer enters their phone number and confirms the payment in their banking app. Your hosted payment page, the Bizum button, and payment links or QR codes all use this single online method.

Bizum Pay

Bizum's in-store payment: at the counter the customer taps their phone on the shop's card terminal (contactless NFC), the same gesture as paying with a contactless card. A separate method from online Bizum.

Blacklist

A list of customers, cards, emails, or IPs you block from paying, to stop repeat fraud or abuse.

Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL)

A payment method that lets customers receive goods now and pay later or in instalments. The BNPL company pays you upfront and collects from the customer directly.

Capture

Taking the funds from a previously authorized payment to complete the charge.

Card brand / network

The card scheme that runs the rails, such as Visa or Mastercard. MONEI accepts all the major brands.

Card-not-present (CNP)

A payment where the physical card isn’t shown to the merchant — an online or phone order. These carry higher fraud risk than in-person payments, which is why a virtual POS (TPV Virtual) is required in Spain.

Cardholder

The person who owns the card and is making the payment — your customer.

Channel manager

Software hotels use to manage room availability and rates across booking sites like Booking.com or Expedia from one place. It also holds guests’ card details; MONEI connects to it to tokenize those cards so the hotel can charge them later.

Chargeback

When a cardholder disputes a charge with their bank and the bank reverses it, returning the funds to the customer. A chargeback fee may apply.

Click to Pay

A faster online checkout backed by Visa, Mastercard, and Discover. Customers save their cards once and pay across participating sites without re-entering card numbers.

Credential on file (COF)

A payment method (such as a saved card) the customer has agreed you can store and charge again later. Card networks require a reference from the first authorized payment to be sent with each later charge.

Currency / multi-currency

The currency a payment is charged in. MONEI can present prices and charge in several currencies depending on your configuration.

Customer- vs merchant-initiated (CIT / MIT)

A customer-initiated payment happens while the customer is present (they may complete 3D Secure). A merchant-initiated (off-session) payment is one you charge when they’re not present, such as recurring billing.

CVC / CVV

The short security code printed on a card (usually 3 digits) used to verify the cardholder has the physical card.

Digital wallet

An app or service that stores a customer’s cards for quick, secure checkout — such as Apple Pay, Google Pay, or Click to Pay.

Dispute

Another word for a chargeback — a customer formally contests a payment through their bank.

Dynamic pricing

MONEI’s progressive pricing for e-commerce: your per-transaction fee decreases as your monthly sales volume grows.

EURM

A euro stablecoin developed by MONEI that keeps a 1:1 value with the euro for digital payments. (Preliminary — details may change.)

Express checkout

One-tap wallet buttons (Apple Pay, Google Pay) shown high in the flow so returning customers can pay instantly.

Failed-payment retries (dunning)

Automatically retrying a recurring payment that failed, before pausing or cancelling the subscription, to recover revenue.

False positive

A legitimate payment that a fraud system wrongly flags and blocks. Lowering your Fraud Detector threshold to catch more fraud also raises the chance of false positives — real orders declined by mistake.

Fraud Detector

MONEI’s risk engine that scores card payments and can automatically block high-risk transactions based on your settings.

Gross payment volume (GPV)

The total value of all payments processed through your account before deductions like refunds or fees. Some volume-based fees are calculated as a percentage of GPV.

HMAC (signature)

Hash-based Message Authentication Code — a way to prove a message came from someone holding a shared secret. MONEI signs every webhook with an HMAC so your server can verify it’s genuine before trusting it.

Hosted Payment Page

A ready-made, MONEI-hosted checkout page you redirect customers to — the quickest way to accept payments with no UI to build.

HTTP header

A key-value field sent alongside an HTTP request or response carrying metadata such as authentication or content type. MONEI signs each webhook with the MONEI-Signature header.

IBAN

The international bank account number MONEI settles your payouts into. You can change it by contacting support.

Interchange

A regulated fee built into every card payment, set by companies like Visa and Mastercard and passed to you at cost — not set by MONEI.

Issuer (issuing bank)

Your customer’s bank — the one that issued their card and decides whether to approve or decline each payment.

KYC (Know Your Customer)

The mandatory checks MONEI runs to verify your business and identity before activating your account, required by financial regulation.

Merchant category code (MCC)

A four-digit code that companies like Visa and Mastercard assign to classify what your business sells (for example, restaurants or retail). It helps determine the interchange rate applied to your card transactions.

Minor currency unit (cents)

API amounts are expressed in the smallest unit of the currency — cents for EUR and USD. So 110 means €1.10, not €110. This avoids rounding errors and is the standard for payment APIs.

MONEI Connect

MONEI’s program for platforms and marketplaces to onboard merchants under their brand and operate their accounts via the API.

MONEI Pay

MONEI’s mobile app that turns a phone into a card terminal — accept QR and tap-to-pay (NFC) payments in person, no extra hardware.

MONEI-Signature

A header MONEI adds to every webhook so your server can verify the request genuinely came from MONEI before trusting it.

NFC (tap to pay)

The contactless technology that lets a customer pay by tapping their card or phone — used by MONEI Pay’s tap-to-pay.

Operations file

A downloadable breakdown of the payments, refunds, and adjustments settled in a single payout — used to reconcile against your records.

PAN (full card number)

Primary Account Number — the full card number (usually 16 digits). When migrating saved cards from another processor to MONEI, the PAN must be sent encrypted so it never travels in plain text.

Pay by Link

Create a payment link and send it by email, WhatsApp, or SMS — accept payments with no website or code.

Payment Component (custom checkout)

Embeddable card and payment-method fields (via monei.js) you place in your own checkout for full control over the design.

Payment gateway

The technology that securely passes a payment from your checkout to the processor for authorization. MONEI is your payment gateway.

Payment method

How the customer chooses to pay — card, Bizum, Apple Pay, Google Pay, PayPal, and so on.

Payment processor

The bank or company that actually moves the money between your customer’s bank and yours. MONEI connects to several — its own acquiring, Redsys, Adyen, Stripe, and more — and can route payments between them.

Payment service provider (PSP)

A platform like MONEI that connects your business to many payment methods and processors through a single integration.

Payment token

A code that stands in for real card details. MONEI issues a one-time token (created in the browser by monei.js for a single payment) and a permanent token (returned after a successful payment so you can charge a saved card again).

Payments orchestration

Rules that decide, per transaction, which processor handles the payment, which payment methods the customer sees, and whether to accept it.

Payout (settlement to you)

The bank transfer MONEI makes to your account from your collected sales. Not to be confused with a payout you send to a customer.

Payout to a customer

Sending money from your MONEI balance to a customer (with Bizum or card) — the reverse of a normal payment. A gated feature that needs a prefunded balance.

PCI DSS

The card-industry security standard for handling card data. Using MONEI’s hosted or component fields keeps card data off your servers.

Pending balance

The funds collected but not yet paid out to your bank account. Your dashboard updates this figure once a day.

Point of sale (POS)

A specific checkout within a store — a register, a table, or a QR code — that you can attach to payments to group and report on them.

POS auth token

A short-lived credential (valid 24 hours) your server creates via the API and passes to the MONEI Pay SDK in your own app. It lets the app accept in-person card payments for a specific account without embedding your permanent API key.

Pre-authorization (authorize & capture)

A two-step payment: first the funds are authorized (reserved on the card without being taken), then captured later to complete the charge. You can capture the full amount, a partial amount, or let the hold expire and release automatically.

Property management system (PMS)

A hotel’s core software for managing reservations, check-in and check-out, billing, and rooms. In the MONEI hotels integration, your PMS is the backend that calls the API to charge tokenized guest cards.

PSD2

The EU payments directive that requires Strong Customer Authentication (such as 3D Secure) for most online card payments.

QR payment

A QR code the customer scans to open a payment page and pay from their phone — useful in-store and at the table.

Reconciliation

Comparing your MONEI payout records against your own sales or accounting records to confirm every transaction is accounted for and the totals match. The operations file and SFTP reports are built for this.

Recurring payment

A payment charged automatically on a schedule using a saved payment method — the basis of subscriptions and installments.

Refund

Returning all or part of a completed payment back to the customer.

Rolling reserve

A portion of each settlement MONEI holds back temporarily as a buffer against future refunds and chargebacks, then releases on the next settlement.

SEPA / SEPA Request to Pay

The euro-area bank-transfer scheme. SEPA Request to Pay (SRTP) lets you request an instant, irrevocable transfer the customer approves in their banking app.

Settlement

Grouping a period’s successful payments so the funds can be paid out to your bank account. Settlement periods are calculated in UTC.

Smart contract

A program stored on a blockchain that runs automatically when set conditions are met, with no middleman. EURM uses smart contracts to issue tokens when euros are deposited and remove them when euros are withdrawn.

Smart routing

Automatically re-sending a payment to a different bank or card processor when the first one declines it — in milliseconds — to recover sales that would otherwise fail. Part of payments orchestration.

SoftPOS

Software Point of Sale — technology that turns an ordinary smartphone into a card terminal using the phone’s NFC chip, with no extra reader. MONEI Pay is a SoftPOS app.

Stablecoin

A type of cryptocurrency designed to hold a fixed value — for example, always equal to €1 — by being backed one-for-one with real money held in reserve, so its price doesn’t fluctuate like Bitcoin.

Statement descriptor

The short text that appears next to a charge on your customer’s card or bank statement. A clear, recognizable descriptor reduces chargebacks from customers who don’t recognize the purchase.

Store

A shop, brand, or business unit within your MONEI account, used to keep locations or businesses separate for reporting and access.

Strong Customer Authentication (SCA)

An EU rule (under PSD2) that requires customers to confirm their identity with at least two independent factors for most online payments. For cards this is handled by 3D Secure; for wallets like Apple Pay, by Face ID or a fingerprint.

Sub-merchant (connected account)

A merchant account created under and managed by a MONEI Connect partner’s account. The sub-merchant accepts payments through the partner’s integration while MONEI handles its verification and compliance.

Subscription

A recurring charge MONEI manages for you — it saves the payment method, runs the billing cycle, and retries failed payments.

T+N settlement (T+1, T+7)

How soon your money arrives, counted from the transaction date (T). T+1 means one day after the sale, T+7 means seven. MONEI settles at T+7 by default, dropping to T+1 for trusted merchants.

Tap to Pay

Accepting contactless cards and phone wallets by having the customer tap directly on your smartphone — no separate card reader. MONEI Pay uses Tap to Pay on iPhone and NFC on Android.

Test mode / live mode

Test mode lets you simulate payments with test cards and no real money; live mode processes real payments. Each has its own API keys.

Tokenization (payment token)

Replacing sensitive card data with a safe reference (a token) you can reuse to charge a saved payment method without handling the card details yourself.

TPV Virtual (virtual POS)

A virtual card terminal issued by an acquiring bank. You only need your own if you bring your own acquirer; otherwise MONEI provides acquiring for you.

Trial period

A free or reduced-price window at the start of a subscription before regular billing begins.

Ultimate beneficial owner (UBO)

Any individual who ultimately owns or controls more than 25% of a company. Payment regulations require MONEI to identify UBOs when verifying your account.

Webhook

An automatic HTTP notification MONEI sends to your server when something happens (a payment succeeds, a refund, a subscription event), so you don’t have to poll.

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