Multi-Acquiring
Last updated:May 30, 2025
As an eCommerce merchant, seamless payment processing is crucial for maintaining your reputation and driving sales. Multi-acquiring
strategies help you intelligently route, dispatch, and recover transactions across multiple acquirers—improving success rates,
reducing costs, and increasing resilience.
From Routing to Recovery – The Full Spectrum of Payment Orchestration
Modern payment orchestration is no longer about isolated optimizations—it’s about designing a cohesive, adaptive flow that intelligently
manages every stage of the transaction lifecycle. This begins with channel routing, which determines the optimal entry point for a
transaction. It continues with dispatching, which selects the best merchant account (MID) based on real-time business rules. And when
things don’t go as planned, smart retry steps in to recover failed transactions using fallback acquirers. By combining these strategies,
merchants can build a layered orchestration model that maximizes approval rates, controls costs, and ensures resilience. Each layer
plays a distinct role, but together they form a powerful, unified system for scalable and intelligent payment processing.
Key Takeaways
- Routing is about which channel the transaction enters.
- Dispatching is about which MID within that channel processes the transaction.
- Smart Retry is about what happens after a decline —recovering the transaction with fallback logic.
Choosing the Right Strategy for Your Business
Routing
In a multi-acquirer environment, merchants often face the burden of integrating with multiple channel entities to handle different
payment types, brands, and regions. This creates operational complexity, slows down innovation, and increases maintenance overhead.
The Simplified Approach: One Merchant Entity, Intelligent Routing
By integrating once with a single merchant entity ID, merchants can delegate the complexity of orchestration to the platform.
Channel Routing intelligently directs transactions to the right channel entity ID based on:
- Card brand (e.g., Visa, MasterCard, Amex)
- Payment type (e.g., authorization, debit/sale, credit/refund)
This removes the need for merchants to manage multiple integrations and lets the platform handle the orchestration dynamically.
Routing Use Cases - Real-World Scenarios
Routes transactions to specific channels based on predefined criteria, such as card brand or payment type.
Brand & Payment Type Routing
Scenario: Optimize routing based on both card brand and transaction type.
Solution: Route Visa authorizations to Acquirer A for lower fees, MasterCard credits to Acquirer B for better approval rates.
Outcome: Reduced processing costs and improved success rates through targeted routing.
Traffic Distribution & Controlled Rollout
Scenario: Test new acquirers or features without disrupting your main payment flow.
Solution: Route 50% of traffic to Acquirer A and 50% to Acquirer B for A/B testing, or send 10% of traffic to a new 3DS version while keeping 90% on the current setup.
Outcome: Safe experimentation and data-driven decisions with minimal risk to operations.
Routing Enables Full Orchestration
Once routed to the appropriate channel, the platform can:
- Dispatch the transaction to the best acquirer based on BIN, geography, or ticket size.
- Apply Smart Retry or Authorization Optimization if the acquirer is temporarily down or declines the transaction.
This layered orchestration is only possible when the merchant integrates once and lets the platform handle the rest.
Conclusion
Channel routing is a key enabler of smart payment orchestration. By routing transactions based on brand or payment type,
merchants can optimize costs, improve approval rates, and reduce complexity—all through a single integration. This approach
ensures efficient, resilient, and scalable payment processing in a dynamic eCommerce landscape.
Dispatching
Dispatching is the process of selecting the best merchant account (MID) to process a transaction once it reaches a payment channel
— whether it got there through routing or was sent directly. Its purpose is to ensure that each transaction is handled by the most
suitable acquirer, based on a set of business rules and real-time conditions. This helps merchants:
- Optimize costs by choosing acquirers with better rates for specific card types or regions.
- Improve approval rates by sending transactions to acquirers with stronger performance for certain banks or shopper profiles.
- Balance load across multiple MIDs to avoid overloading a single acquirer.
- Manage risk by directing high-risk transactions to acquirers with advanced fraud protection.
In short, dispatching gives merchants fine-grained control over how transactions are processed — without
needing to hard-code logic or manage multiple integrations manually.
Dispatching Use Cases – Real-World Scenarios
BIN Country Dispatching Optimize for Local Acquirers
Scenario: A merchant processes transactions from multiple countries and wants to improve approval rates by using local acquirers.
Solution: Route cards issued in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland to Acquirer A, which specializes in DACH-region processing.
Outcome: Higher approval rates and better customer experience due to localized processing.
Ticket Size Dispatching – Control Costs Based on Transaction Value
Scenario: A merchant wants to optimize processing fees by directing high- and low-value transactions to different acquirers.
Solution: Route transactions under €50 to Acquirer B (lower fixed fees), and transactions over €50 to Acquirer C (better percentage rates).
Outcome: Reduced overall processing costs by aligning transaction value with the most cost-effective acquirer.
How It Works
Dispatching is triggered when a transaction reaches a payment channel—either through routing or direct targeting. The system
then evaluates dispatching rules in a specific order to determine the best merchant account for processing.
Global Dispatching Rules (Evaluated First)
Executed first, one rule at a time, in strict priority order (1 to 4), across the hierarchy: Channel → Merchant → Division → PSP
- Payment Type Dispatching – Based on transaction type (e.g., credit / refund, direct debit / credit transfer, online transfer).
- Shopper Type Dispatching – Distinguishes between first-time and returning shoppers.
- Recurring Dispatching – Routes based on recurring vs. one-time transactions.
- Ticket Size Dispatching – Based on the transaction amount.
Global rules evaluate the entire hierarchy
one rule at a time, stopping as soon as a match is found. If no match is
found for any global rule, local rules are evaluated next.
Local Dispatching Rules (Evaluated After Global)
Executed only if no Global rule results in a match. Local rules are evaluated in order of priority at each level of the hierarchy:
- Merchant Account Velocity Dispatcher – Limits volume per MID over time.
- Clearing Institute Velocity Dispatcher – Controls volume per clearing institute.
- BIN Range and BIN Country Dispatching – Routes based on card BIN or issuing country.
- Weight Dispatcher – Prioritizes MIDs to influence distribution.
Local rules evaluate all rules at each level (Channel → Merchant → Division → PSP) before moving up. If a match is found, that
merchant account is used. If no match is found at any level, the system selects a
random merchant account attached to the same
channel that matches the required configuration (e.g., brand, currency).
Conclusion
Dispatching plays a critical role in optimizing how transactions are processed across multiple merchant accounts. By
applying prioritized rules to select the best-fit acquirer, it helps merchants improve approval rates, control costs,
and manage risk—automatically and efficiently. It’s a key component of a smart, scalable payment orchestration strategy.
Smart Retry
Smart Retry is an intelligent payment optimization feature that automatically retries failed transactions using
fallback acquirers or modified transaction parameters. Its goal is to increase payment success rates, reduce friction,
and improve customer experience by adapting to the reasons behind transaction failures.
How It Works
Smart Retry identifies the reason for a transaction failure and applies a retry strategy based on:
- Type of decline (e.g., soft vs. hard).
- Fallback acquirers with better acceptance profiles.
- Authentication enhancements (e.g., adding Strong Customer Authentication data when required).
Top 2 Real-World Use Cases
Cross-Border Payment Recovery
Scenario: A European electronics store receives an order from a customer in India, but the transaction is declined by the local acquirer due to regional risk scoring.
Solution: Smart Retry reroutes the transaction to a global acquirer with better acceptance rates for Indian-issued cards.
Outcome: The transaction is approved, and the customer completes the purchase successfully.
Subscription Renewal Continuity
Scenario: A video streaming platform attempts to renew a user’s monthly subscription, but the transaction fails due to a temporary bank network issue.
Solution: Smart Retry detects the soft decline and retries the transaction with the same or a different acquirer.
Outcome: The retry succeeds, ensuring uninterrupted service for the customer.
Business Model Adaptation
- Global Acquirer: Retry failed transactions with a global acquirer when local acquirers decline.
- High-Risk Profiles: Use fallback acquirers with greater flexibility for high-risk transactions.
Understanding Bank Rejects
Soft Bank Rejects
- Issue: Temporary issues that can be retried immediately.
- Example: Payment fails due to a temporary connection issue. Smart Retry resubmits the transaction.
Hard Bank Rejects
- Issue: Permanent failures that should not be retried until resolved.
- Example: Payment declined because the card is reported stolen. Do not retry until resolved with the issuing bank.
Smart Retry is particularly effective for handling soft bank rejects, increasing the likelihood of successful payment completion.
Conclusion
Smart Retry is a strategic tool that enhances payment resilience and customer satisfaction. By intelligently handling failed
transactions—especially soft declines—it ensures higher conversion rates, fewer lost sales, and a smoother checkout experience.
Businesses leveraging Smart Retry can adapt to global payment complexities, reduce friction, and build trust with their customers.
Strategy Stacking
In a multi-acquirer environment, optimizing payments requires more than isolated tactics. Strategy stacking brings together distinct
orchestration layers—each with a specific role in the transaction journey. By aligning routing, dispatching, and smart retry,
merchants can create a seamless, intelligent flow that adapts to real-time conditions and business priorities.
Orchestration Strategies Overview
Strategy |
Description |
When to Use |
Channel Routing |
Directs transactions to the appropriate payment channel (entity ID) based on brand or payment type. |
To simplify integration, optimize cost, and segment traffic by brand/type. |
Dispatching |
Selects the best merchant account (MID) within a channel using prioritized business rules. |
To optimize approval rates, manage risk, and control processing costs. |
Smart Retry |
Retries failed transactions using fallback acquirers after a decline. |
To recover from soft declines and temporary issues without user disruption. |
Combining Strategies for Robust Multi-Acquiring
Combined Strategy |
Description |
When to Use |
Channel Routing + Dispatching |
Routes transactions to the right channel, then selects the best MID using business rules. |
When you want centralized integration with granular control over processing. |
Dispatching + Smart Retry |
Selects the best MID, and if the transaction fails, retries with a fallback acquirer. |
When optimizing for approval and ensuring recovery from soft declines. |
Channel Routing + Smart Retry |
Routes to the right channel, and retries failed transactions with fallback acquirers. |
When simplifying integration and ensuring resilience against acquirer failures. |
Channel Routing + Dispatching + Smart Retry |
Full orchestration: route to the right channel, dispatch to the best MID, and retry if needed. |
When you need end-to-end optimization for cost, risk, and success rates. |
See also