Merchant Website Compliance Checker for Onboarding

Merchant Website Compliance Checker

Merchant Website Compliance Checker automates the merchant website review used in onboarding and underwriting: give it merchant URLs and get policy pages, contact details, company and VAT numbers, SSL status and high-risk keyword hits for each site.

Best for: Acquirers, PSPs and payment facilitators onboarding merchants, risk and underwriting teams, and ISOs pre-checking prospects.

What does Merchant Website Compliance Checker do?

Automates the website review that acquirers, PSPs and payment facilitators do at merchant onboarding (card-scheme style checks). For each URL it reports:

• Presence + URL of Terms & Conditions, Refund/Returns, Privacy, Cookie, Shipping, Contact pages
• Contact details: emails, UK phone numbers, UK postcodes
• UK company number and VAT number stated on the site (pair with UK Company Check actor to verify)
• SSL: valid cert, issuer, days to expiry, HTTPS redirect
• Prohibited / high-risk goods keywords (CBD, vapes, gambling, crypto, replicas, nutraceutical "free trial" etc. + your own list)
• flags[] and a simple riskScore 0–100

Heuristic tool: an aid for human underwriters, not a compliance decision.

How to check a merchant website for onboarding

1. Add merchant website URLs to Merchant URLs (startUrls).
2. Optionally add your own terms to Extra prohibited keywords.
3. Click Start and review flags and riskScore for each site.

Pricing (pay-per-event)

• site-checked: $0.01 per site ($10 / 1,000).
• Example: 10,000 sites cost $100.00.

Example input

{
  "startUrls": [
    "https://www.yorkshiretea.co.uk"
  ],
  "maxPolicyPages": 6
}

Example output

Values below are illustrative.

{
  "url": "https://www.yorkshiretea.co.uk",
  "ssl": {
    "valid": true,
    "daysToExpiry": 100
  },
  "policies": {
    "termsAndConditions": {
      "found": true
    },
    "refundPolicy": {
      "found": false
    }
  },
  "companyNumbers": [
    "543821"
  ],
  "prohibitedKeywordHits": [],
  "flags": [
    "missing:refundPolicy"
  ],
  "riskScore": 15
}

Use it via API, schedules and integrations

Run it in Apify Console, or call it from your own code with the Apify API or the Python and JavaScript clients. Save an input as a task and add a schedule to run it regularly, and send results to Slack, email, webhooks, Zapier, Make or n8n with Apify integrations. AI agents can find and run it through the Apify MCP server.

from apify_client import ApifyClient

client = ApifyClient("YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN")
run = client.actor("sterlingverify/merchant-compliance-checker").call(run_input={"startUrls": ["https://www.yorkshiretea.co.uk"]})
for item in client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items():
    print(item)

Use in Clay, Zapier, Make, n8n, Pipedream, Power Automate or Activepieces

All of them connect to Apify through their official Apify integrations, using your own Apify account: an API token from Apify Console > Settings > API & Integrations, or Apify sign-in for Power Automate. Runs bill to your Apify account at this Actor's pay-per-event price.

• Clay: save this Actor's input as an Apify task and copy it as JSON. In your Clay table, add the Run Apify Actor enrichment, choose it and paste the JSON into Input Data, mapping Clay columns into the fields. To pull a finished run into a new table, use the Import data from Apify Actor source.
• Zapier: use the Apify Run Actor action, or the Finished Actor run trigger followed by Fetch dataset items. Synchronous runs in Zapier stop after 30 seconds, so use the trigger for big batches.
• Make: add the Apify Run an Actor module with Run synchronously set to Yes, then Get Dataset Items with the run's dataset ID. For longer runs, use the Watch Actor Runs trigger.
• n8n: install the Apify node (@apify/n8n-nodes-apify, or search "Apify" on n8n Cloud) and use Run an Actor and get dataset.
• Pipedream: add the Apify app's Run Actor action, or Run Task Synchronously on one of this Actor's public example tasks (or your own saved task) to get the dataset items back in one step. For big batches, start from the New Finished Actor Run or New Finished Task Run trigger, then Get Dataset Items.
• Power Automate: add the Apify connector (a premium connector, currently in preview) and sign in with your Apify account. Use Run Actor with Enter custom value set to sterlingverify/merchant-compliance-checker and paste the input as JSON, then Get dataset items with the run's default dataset ID. For big batches, start the flow from the Actor run finished trigger instead.
• Activepieces: add the Apify piece and use Run Actor, or Run Task on one of this Actor's public example tasks (or your own saved task), then Get Dataset Items. For scheduled or big batches, use the Watch Actor Runs or Watch Task Runs trigger.
• Google Drive / Sheets: add Apify's Upload results to GDrive integration to a scheduled task to drop each run's CSV or XLSX into your team's Drive, or chain the Google Sheets Import & Export actor to append rows to a sheet.
• Slack alerts: add Apify's Slack integration to a scheduled task to post each run's results to your team channel, or start a check from Slack with /apify call and your task ID.
• Email digests: add Apify's Send results email via Gmail integration to a scheduled task to attach each run's CSV/JSON to your inbox.
• Microsoft Teams alerts: add an Apify webhook (HTTP request on run succeeded or failed) to a scheduled task, point it at a Teams Workflows incoming-webhook URL, and set the payload template to an Adaptive Card message so each run posts an alert into your channel.
• Airbyte: add Apify Dataset as a source in Airbyte (dataset ID + Apify API token) to move a run's results into Snowflake, BigQuery, Postgres or another Airbyte destination.
• Dify: install Apify's apify-integration plugin from the Dify Marketplace and use Run Actor as a tool in a Workflow or Chatflow, or point this Actor's Run succeeded HTTP webhook at a published Dify app's plugin endpoint to trigger it.
• Workato: install the Apify connector from Workato's Community library (Custom connectors), connect it with your Apify API token, and run this Actor inside a recipe or trigger a recipe when a run finishes.
• Any HTTP tool or script: send one request and get the results back as JSON. Runs must finish within 5 minutes.

curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/sterlingverify~merchant-compliance-checker/run-sync-get-dataset-items" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d @input.json

FAQ

Is this a compliance decision?

No. It is a heuristic screening aid for human underwriters, not a compliance or legal determination.

Can I verify the company number it finds?

Yes. Pair it with UK Company Check to look the company up on Companies House.

Disclaimer

Heuristic screening aid for underwriters, not a compliance or legal determination. JavaScript-only sites are reported as unreliable.

Platform usage is included in the per-event price; you pay only for results.

Related sterlingVerify tools

Part of the sterlingVerify UK payments, KYB and data toolkit on Apify Store:

• UK Company Check: Companies House, VAT and UK sanctions KYB check in one call
• MCC Checker: check a merchant's MCC against its website or description
• PCI Readiness Scanner: passive checkout security check with a likely SAQ type
• Payments Stack Detector: find which PSPs, wallets and BNPL a store uses
• UK Sanctions Screener: fuzzy screening against the UK Sanctions List (FCDO)