The Shop-in-Shop service includes specific roles, account types, and tools that shape how the setup works. This glossary explains the responsibilities of admins and sub-merchants, the purpose of aggregator and commission accounts, and the use of the Merchant panel and Partner portal so you can manage payments and sub-merchants effectively in Paytrail’s system.
In the Shop-in-Shop service, there are two roles: the admin and the sub-merchants.
The admin is the platform owner or main operator who manages the overall setup. The admin creates sub-merchant accounts, oversees payment flows, and can apply commissions to transactions if needed. Payments are created using the admin’s aggregator account, and funds are automatically routed to the correct sub-merchants.
The admin could be:
- A marketplace owner managing sellers
- A sports club managing individual teams
- A company managing business units
- An event organizer managing vendors or partners
The aggregator account is created for the admin and includes the Merchant ID and authentication key. These are required to connect to the payment interface.
All payments are initiated through this account, and Paytrail automatically settles the funds to the appropriate sub-merchants.
Payments cannot be received directly to the aggregator account, and no settlement report is generated for it.
The commission/fee account is a sub-merchant account with its own Merchant ID and authentication key.
It can be used to:
- Collect commissions earned by the admin
- Cover the Paytrail transaction fees on behalf of the sub-merchant
This account can also receive payments if the admin is also acting as a seller. For clarity, many admins choose to create a separate sub-merchant account specifically for receiving direct payments.
A sub-merchant is the actual seller or recipient of funds. Each sub-merchant account has its own Merchant ID and authentication key in addition to an agreement with Paytrail.
The admin controls the structure and visibility of the overall Shop-in-Shop environment.
The Merchant panel is a dashboard for tracking and managing payments. It allows you to view transactions, issue refunds, and access settlement reports.
Each merchant account (aggregator or sub-merchant) has its own login credentials for the Merchant panel. Multiple users can be added to each account.
The authentication key is used to authenticate payments via the API.
Only the aggregator account (admin) has access to the authentication key. It can be found in the Merchant panel under Merchant account.
The Partner portal is a dashboard for admins to create and manage sub-merchants within the Shop-in-Shop service.