Smart Check: Helping High-Risk PSPs Take Control of Their Traffic

If you work with high-risk merchants — particularly in verticals like iGaming and Forex— you know how critical it is to manage transaction traffic correctly. One of the biggest challenges is separating trusted traffic from untrusted, so you can safely route transactions and protect your sensitive acquiring channels.

At eComCharge, we addressed this challenge by developing Smart Check — an intelligent tool that helps PSPs collect and apply card usage data directly in their routing rules.

Why this problem matters

Most high-risk merchants rely on at least two acquiring channels:

• One for untrusted cards (first-time payment attempts),
• One for trusted cards (previously successfully used cards).

Why does it matter?

• These channels often differ in terms of cost and reliability.
• Sending untrusted traffic to a channel meant for trusted cards can lead to high decline rates and eventually get the channel blocked.
• Merchants often don’t know whether a card can be considered trusted, especially when it’s seen for the first time.

It’s important to note that trusted and untrusted are merchant—or PSP-defined categories—there’s no universal standard. That’s where Smart Check comes in.

What Smart Check does

Smart Check is a service built into the beGateway platform. It collects transaction history across all cards in the system — including the type of transaction and its final status (successful or not). This data can then be used to build custom routing rules in Smart Routing, allowing PSPs to make traffic decisions based on a card’s actual usage history.

How PSPs can use Smart Check data

Smart Check provides detailed counters for each card — showing the number of successful and failed transactions by type:

• Authorization
• Capture
• Payment
• Payout
• Refund
• P2P transfers
• Chargebacks

You can use this data to create your own logic inside Smart Routing. For example:

Smart Check provides the data — you define the rules. The result is complete flexibility and smarter routing logic based on real card behavior.

Key capabilities of Smart Check

• Granular transaction data collection: Covers all card activity in the beGateway system, across all major transaction types.
• Integration with Smart Routing: Use Smart Check data to power real-time routing decisions.
• Access to historical counters: Separate counters for each transaction type (success/failure), configurable up to 360 days.
• Local or global database: Choose the scope of your data:
  • Local DB: Only data collected by your PSP.
  • Global DB: Data collected across all PSPs on beGateway.
• Merchant-level configuration: Enable Smart Check and select data sources per merchant — giving you precise control.
• Activation on request: Smart Check is off by default and only activated upon request. Data collection continues regardless of activation.

What’s new?

We’ve recently made Smart Check even more flexible:

• It’s now enabled by request — giving PSPs more control.
• Use of Smart Check in Smart Routing can be enabled at the merchant level.
• You can now choose between local and global datasets, depending on your traffic strategy.

Why PSPs love Smart Check

• No manual analysis required — everything runs automatically.
• Protect sensitive acquiring channels by keeping untrusted cards out.
• Improve conversion rates through more accurate routing.
• Custom logic made easy — you define the rules based on real transaction history.
• Powerful risk control, even when testing new flows or onboarding unstable traffic.

Ready to try it?

If you're already using beGateway by eComCharge, just let us know. We’ll activate Smart Check for your PSP and help you configure the logic.

If you're launching a new PSP or looking for a platform upgrade, we’ll show you how Smart Check can transform your business.