GoPay is a financial institution whose activities are supervised by the Czech National Bank and the Ministry of Finance. We therefore have to comply with a whole range of rules and regulations, such as:
the rules against money laundering and the financing of terrorism
the Payments Act
the rules of the card schemes (Visa, Mastercard)
All these rules directly affect who we can enter into cooperation with and what goods we can process payments for through the payment gateway.
Anti-money laundering rules
To prevent the payment system being misused, for example to legalise the proceeds of crime, we use our own AML rules based on Czech Act No. 253/2008 Coll., on certain measures against the legalisation of the proceeds of crime and the financing of terrorism.
One consequence of these rules is that we have to identify all merchants, i.e. verify their identity and, in the case of companies, know their beneficial owners.
You can learn more about identity verification here. You will find the full text of Act No. 253/2008 Coll. here.
Internal policies and procedures
How we guard our payment system against misuse for fraudulent transactions is defined not only by the AML Act but also by our internal policies and procedures. That means that:
we monitor and assess suspicious transactions
we check e-shops
we check merchants at the level of their management and ownership structure against EU sanctions lists
and more
All these activities are subject to checks by the Ministry of Finance of the Czech Republic and other relevant bodies that supervise us.
Card scheme rules
A card scheme is an association of payment card issuers, which include Visa, Mastercard, Diners Club, American Express, Discover and others. GoPay works with Visa and Mastercard, in whose programmes it is registered as a Payment Facilitator and Payment Service Provider.
The card schemes stand at the very top of the pyramid in the payment card business and therefore decide who may handle their cards and who may not. The schemes' rules therefore fundamentally influence our position on approving payment card acceptance.
The schemes do not make their decisions arbitrarily. They try to guarantee maximum safety for customers paying on the internet. And because some sectors carry greater risks (the risk of money laundering, fraudulent payments, misleading customers, damage to the reputation of the card business), the schemes try to restrict that kind of goods. This applies in particular to goods falling into the prohibited category and goods considered risky.
You will find more information about the methodology for assessing goods and merchant credibility on our blog in the article Why payment gateways cannot work with every e-shop.
You can read why payment gateways have to follow the card scheme rules in particular in the article Why we at GoPay reject certain kinds of goods.