Evidence before promises.
Align payment methods, merchant onboarding, operational ownership and settlement before development.
Reduce sensitive data exposure
Prefer provider-hosted card entry and tokenized references. Confirm PCI DSS scope and evidence for the selected payment flow.
Verify every payment event
Validate webhook signatures, prevent replay and use idempotent processing before updating session or financial state.
Define market responsibilities
Document the merchant of record, acquiring provider, KYC/AML responsibilities and data-processing roles before launch.
Build operational resilience
Agree monitoring, escalation, reconciliation and recovery procedures. Review service commitments in the final contract.