Airwallex Merchant of Record overviewEarly access

The Merchant of Record (MoR) is the business that legally sells a product to the shopper and carries the seller's obligations: charging the shopper, collecting and remitting sales tax, and meeting local compliance rules for that sale.

By default, you are the Merchant of Record for everything you sell. This means you are responsible for calculating and remitting sales tax in every country where your shoppers are located, which typically requires registering with each country's tax authority.

When you use Airwallex's MoR product, Airwallex acts as the legal seller for the transactions you choose. Airwallex purchases the product from you and resells it to your shopper, assuming responsibility for calculating the tax, collecting it, and remitting it to the local authorities for that sale.

For example: you are a games studio in Korea selling an in-game item to a shopper in the United States. Without MoR, you would be responsible for registering for and remitting US state-level sales tax yourself. With Airwallex as your MoR, Airwallex is the seller of record for that sale, calculates and collects the applicable sales tax at checkout, and remits it. You continue to receive your revenue and operate your business as usual.

You retain control of your product, your pricing, your customer relationship, and your refunds and disputes processes.

MoR is an add-on to Airwallex's Payments product, our card and payment processing product. If you already use our Payments product, you can enable MoR without rebuilding your integration.

Responsibilities with Airwallex MoR

The table shows who is responsible for each part of a sale, with and without Airwallex MoR.

Eligibility

Airwallex MoR is available to a limited set of merchants during the beta. You are eligible if all of the following apply:

• You use Airwallex Payments product, or are willing to onboard to it. MoR requires an active Airwallex Payments integration.
• You sell digital products. Supported examples include games and in-game items, SaaS and software, design assets, e-books, and digital vouchers. Physical goods are not supported.
• You sell directly to your shoppers, rather than through a marketplace.

Supported integration options

During the beta, Airwallex MoR supports one integration method:

• Hosted Payment Page (HPP)

The following integration methods are not yet supported:

• Native API
• Checkout Elements
• Payment plugins
• Payment links
• Billing Checkout

How it works

The following describes a single transaction from start to finish.

1. You create the payment and send the shopper to the Airwallex Hosted Payment Page (HPP), our ready-made checkout page. You include the product details (name, price, and a tax category for each item).
2. The shopper enters their email and billing address on the checkout page. Airwallex collects and validates these directly.
3. Airwallex calculates the sales tax due and shows it at checkout.
4. After payment, Airwallex sends the shopper a tax-compliant receipt (and a credit note later if the sale is refunded).
5. Airwallex settles your Wallet with the net amount, withholding the tax collected and the applicable MoR fees. The collected tax is reserved and remitted to the relevant authority.

Coverage and supported markets

You can sell to shoppers in any country. Airwallex acts as your Merchant of Record globally and manages the tax in every market where your shoppers are located.

You decide which shopper countries you want Airwallex to act as your MoR in during your onboarding process. For shoppers outside your selection, you remain the Merchant of Record and are responsible for the tax on those sales.

Tax calculation and collection

For sales where Airwallex is your Merchant of Record, Airwallex calculates the correct sales tax, VAT, or GST in real time at checkout, collects it from the shopper, and remits it to the local tax authority. You do not need new tax registrations or local entities to sell into these markets.

Three factors determine how tax is applied:

• Inclusive or exclusive pricing: During onboarding, you choose whether the price you set already includes tax (inclusive) or whether tax is added at checkout (exclusive).
• Product tax category: You tag each product with a tax category. Airwallex uses it to apply the correct rate to each item. The supported categories are listed in the Airwallex Tax categories reference.
• Shopper location: Tax depends on the shopper's location, so Airwallex collects and validates the billing address on the checkout page. Any billing address you send in the request is discarded and re-collected from the shopper, because Airwallex must validate it as the seller.

Coverage limits: if a sale falls outside the countries you have enabled, or outside what MoR supports, the transaction is processed as a standard non-MoR payment and you remain responsible for the tax on it.

Refund and dispute handling

You continue to manage refunds and disputes for MoR transactions, just as you do for standard payments. The difference is what happens to the tax.

When you issue a full refund on an MoR transaction, Airwallex deducts the full refund amount (including tax) from your wallet but then credits the tax portion back, since Airwallex no longer needs to remit that tax. The shopper receives the full amount they paid, including tax. Airwallex also sends the shopper a credit note for their records.

For partial refunds, Airwallex recalculates the tax on the reduced amount and reverses the difference. For example, if you refund one product from a two-product order, Airwallex reverses the tax attributable to that product.

How tax is calculated on refunds

Airwallex uses the tax behavior of the original PaymentIntent (inclusive or exclusive) to calculate the sales tax on the refund amount.

• Inclusive: The refund amount already contains tax. Airwallex extracts the tax from the refund total. For example, if the refund amount is 120 and the tax rate is 20%, the sales tax reversed is 20 (120 / 1.20 × 0.20).
• Exclusive: The refund amount does not contain tax. Airwallex adds the tax on top. For example, if the refund amount is 120 and the tax rate is 20%, the sales tax reversed is 24 (120 × 0.20).

For disputes (chargebacks), the same tax-reversal logic applies when a dispute is resolved in the shopper's favour. If the dispute is resolved in your favour, no tax adjustment is made and the original transaction stands.

Settlement and reconciliation

For each MoR transaction, Airwallex settles your wallet with the net amount after withholding sales tax, which is collected by Airwallex from the shopper and is remitted to the relevant tax authority. Every sales tax deduction appears as a separate line item in your settlement report so you can reconcile every deduction.

Every Airwallex MoR PaymentIntent includes a full tax breakdown:

• Per-product tax amount and tax percentage in order.products[].tax_amount and order.products[].tax_percentage
• Order-level totals in order.tax.total_amount and order.tax.effective_rate
• Whether pricing was inclusive or exclusive in order.tax.tax_behavior

Shopper experience

Because Airwallex is the legal seller for MoR transactions, your shoppers will see the following:

• A note at checkout: The checkout page states that Airwallex is the Merchant of Record, with wording such as "Merchant of Record services provided to [Your Business] by Airwallex", plus links to our Terms and Privacy Policy .
• Airwallex on their bank statement: The statement descriptor is prefixed with AWX*, for example AWX*YourBusiness.
• Receipts and credit notes: Airwallex emails every shopper a tax-compliant receipt after payment, and a credit note when a refund requires one.
• Payment methods: Shoppers can pay with any MoR-supported method available for their country and currency. See supported payment methods for the full list.
• Mandatory checkout fields: Email and billing address are mandatory for an MoR sale. The shopper provides these at checkout.

Supported payment methods

Shoppers can pay with the methods below, where they are available for the shopper's country and currency:

• Cards: Visa, Mastercard, American Express, JCB, Discover, Diners Club, Maestro, UnionPay, and UnionPay International
• Digital wallets: Apple Pay, Google Pay, and AIRI
• Bank transfers and direct debit: ACH, ACH Direct Debit, SEPA Direct Debit, BACS Direct Debit, FPS, PayNow, PIX, and other bank debits
• Buy now, pay later: Afterpay, Klarna

Next steps

• If you meet the eligibility criteria and want to use Airwallex's Merchant of Record product, contact your Airwallex Account Manager to nominate your business for the Beta.
• Confirm your MoR settings with us during onboarding: which shopper countries you want Airwallex to act as MoR in, and whether your pricing is tax-inclusive or exclusive.
• Map your products to the correct tax categories so Airwallex calculates tax accurately.
• Review Integrating with Airwallex Merchant of Record to ensure your integration supports the MoR product.