Overview
Introduction
An individual customer is an end-user who holds the balance. In a corporate travel-and-expense (T&E) use case, this would be a staff member who receives a T&E card. In a consumer-funded use case, this would be a retail end-customer who has an account. Depending on the nature of the product or program, the know-your-customer (KYC) and the onboarding process differ. Work with your Nium representative to determine the right approach. Where KYC is mandatory, vendors in multiple markets automate Nium's electronic know-your-customer (eKYC) options and KYC and onboarding process.
Customer onboarding process
The following are the steps of the Nium customer onboarding process:
- Customer account creation
- Customer compliance check
- Compliance score and status change flow
- Request for information (RFI) flow
1. Customer account creation
You can create the customer account by providing customer details through the Unified Add Customer API. The customer details include the customer’s personal, contact, KYC, and tax details. Some of the details are optional depending on the region and the defined KYC option.
These are the KYC options:
Once you create the customer account, the compliance process begins automatically.
2. Customer compliance checks
The customer compliance check involves customer verification, screening, and the KYC process. Depending on the program, the customer may be screened or go through the KYC process.
Step | Description |
---|---|
Screening | Checks whether the customer is part of any of the regulatory blacklists and if Nium can legally do business with the customer. |
KYC | Verifies whether the customer details are accurate. It includes authenticating the customer's identity and address using proof of identity (PoI) and proof of address (PoA). The PoI and PoA are verified in two ways:MANUAL_KYC is performed by the Nium compliance team for all markets.eKYC is performed by the Nium compliance team for the Australia and US markets.eDocVerify is performed by vendors in multiple European Union and UK markets. |
Depending on how the KYC is performed, the compliance templates are defined for the particular client. These templates are also managed at two levels:
Screening
Screening + KYC
Depending on the program, either of these can be configured. If both are configured, then Screening + KYC
are initiated.
3. Compliance score and status change flow
These compliance templates are a group of compliance services that are meant to be run when compliance checks are initiated. Based on the template, these services are invoked whenever the customer is created on the Nium One platform.
Each of these services has a separate compliance status as detailed in this table:
Compliance status | Description |
---|---|
INITIATED | Compliance is initiated and the customer needs to take a few more steps to complete the KYC process, such as adding the required information. This status is applicable only for eKYC. |
IN PROGRESS | The KYC compliance process is in progress and the customer has some pending action, such as uploading a document. |
ACTION REQUIRED | The customer uploads documents and waits for verification from the compliance team. |
RFI REQUESTED | The Nium compliance team raises a request-for-information (RFI) and the customer responds to the RFI through the Respond To RFI API. |
COMPLETED | The compliance process completes. |
ERROR | No action is taken. The customer application fails due to an error. Contact Nium customer support for assistance. |
EXPIRED | The submitted document's date expires. The Nium team may raise an RFI. |
REJECT | If the compliance team rejects the KYC process, the status changes to REJECT . The reinitiate-KYC process is available in this case. |
Each action depends upon separate kycStatus
and complianceStatus
as detailed in this table:
KYC status | Compliance status | Your next action | APIs involved | Remarks |
---|---|---|---|---|
Pending | INITIATED | Wait for the compliance status callback. | Customer Details | eKYC is initiated. The system updates the status according the KYC vendor and our screening results. |
Failed | REJECT | Reinitiate eKYC by providing the same customerHashId . | Customer Details Unified Add Customer | Check the remarks or the compliance remarks. |
Pending | ERROR | Email Nium. | Customer Details | Nium's compliance team might need to check the errors manually. |
Pending | ACTION_REQUIRED | Wait for the next compliance status update. | Customer Details | Nium's compliance team requires a manual check on this request. |
Pending | RFI_REQUESTED | Check the rfiDetails array and provide the requested information through the Respond To RFI API. | Customer Details Respond To RFI | Nium's compliance team requires additional information to verify the customer. |
Pending | RFI_RESPONDED | Wait for the next compliance status update. | Customer Details | Nium's compliance team verifies the information in your Respond To RFI API. Usually, the system updates the compliance status to ACTION_REQUIRED . |
Clear | COMPLETED | Continue your user journey, for example, Add card. | Customer Details | eKYC is successful and the customer is onboarded. |
NOTE
Nium calls the compliance status callback URL to inform you of any change in the compliance status. Then, you need to call the Customer Details API to retrieve the detailed information.
Within the complianceStatus
:
INITIATED
is the highest status.COMPLETED
is the lowest status.
The overall compliance score is calculated based on the statuses of the individual services. The highest status among all the invoked services for that customer is considered the overall compliance status.
The client learns about each customer compliance status change through the compliance status callback URL, which is captured during the client onboarding process. Whenever a client receives this notification, they get the updated customer details using the Customer Details API.
4. RFI flow
When the Nium compliance team finds insufficient information, it takes the following actions:
-
Initiates the RFI and the customer's compliance status becomes
RFI REQUESTED
. -
The client receives a nudge during the compliance status callback URL; that is, the next time they call the Customer Details API, they get the status as
RFI REQUESTED
with the reason. -
The client calls the Respond To RFI API and provides the requested information.
-
The compliance status changes to
RFI RESPONDED
. -
The compliance team reviews the information and takes the necessary action.
Updated 29 days ago