Get Started with Acquiring

Highnote's Acquiring platform lets you accept and process card payments. Start with one question: are you accepting payments for your own business, or are your customers the ones accepting payments? Pick a path and it points you to the right integration guide.

Path 1: "I am a merchant."

You sell your own goods or services and want to accept card payments for them. You are the merchant of record. Highnote is your acquiring processor.

Who it fits

One legal entity accepting payments for its own sales.

Who owns onboarding

Highnote. Underwriting, compliance, and network registration are handled for you.

Who gets settled

You. Funds settle to your account on your program's schedule.

Highnote

Acquiring processor, owns onboarding

→

You

Merchant of record

→

Your buyers

Pay you by card

Start from a use case

Sell on my own online store

One-time card payments at checkout.

Bill my customers on a subscription

Recurring payments against a stored card.

Increase an authorization as the total grows

A higher hold on a transaction that's already open.

Path 2: "My customers are merchants."

You run a platform, marketplace, or software product, and the businesses using it need to accept card payments. You onboard them as submerchants. The payment API calls are the same as Path 1, run once per submerchant. What differs is who owns onboarding, compliance, and disbursement for each one.

Highnote owns the merchant relationship

Highnote

Holds the license, underwrites each submerchant

↓ sponsors your program

You

Own the product and the submerchant experience

↓ onboards through you

Submerchant

Underwritten and disbursed by Highnote

Onboard each submerchant with onboardBusiness, using the merchant type.

You own the merchant relationship

You

Own onboarding, compliance, disbursement, and pricing

↓ processes through

Highnote

Processor

↑ enables your direct relationship

The business you onboard

Underwritten and disbursed by you

Set up with your Highnote representative at the program level before you onboard your first business.

info

Both arrangements use the same integration. Which one applies is a commercial and compliance decision — confirm it with your Highnote representative before you build, because the program-level setup differs.

Start from a use case

Embed payment acceptance in my SaaS product

Your customers get paid inside your software.

Collect recurring payments for my customers

Billing run on each submerchant's behalf.

Run a marketplace that pays out sellers

Accept on one side, disburse on the other.

Not sure which path is yours?

If the money you are collecting is for your own sales, you are on Path 1. If it is for someone else's sales, you are on Path 2. You can build before the commercial arrangement is settled. If you are still unsure, talk to your Highnote representative before you start building.