High-Risk Business Enablement
Understand which high-risk business types need Klarna's approval before you onboard Partners, and what approval involves for each.
8 min read
Overview
Under Section 8.2.1 High-Risk Business Types of the Klarna Network Rules, you need Klarna's approval before you onboard Partners in certain business types.
These business types fall into two categories:
- Elevated Financial Crime Risk. Business types with more exposure to fraud, money laundering, terrorist financing, bribery or corruption. These need a full enablement review.
- Elevated Conduct Risk. Business types with higher conduct, customer-protection or reputational risk. These go through a simpler, questionnaire-based enablement.
Approval is given per business type, not per Partner. Once Klarna approves you for a business type, you can onboard further Partners in that business type without asking for individual approvals, as long as you keep to any conditions attached to the approval.
Whether a Partner falls into a business type depends on what the business actually does, not on its MCC. The MCCs in the Klarna Network Rules are indicative only and not exhaustive. If you aren't sure whether a Partner is in scope, ask us before you onboard it.
Prohibited businesses
This page covers enablement for high-risk business types only. For businesses that can't use Klarna at all, see Prohibited and restricted businesses.
How to get started
To request enablement, notify Klarna of:
- The business types and markets you want to enable
- Whether you already have Partners live with Klarna in any of these business types
- Your expected volume in each business type
Klarna will confirm the next steps.
High-risk business enablement at a glance
| Elevated Financial Crime Risk | Elevated Conduct Risk | |
|---|---|---|
| Business types | See Section 8.2.1.1 of the Klarna Network Rules, including: • Charities • Crowdfunding • Erotic and adult services • Gambling, betting or lotteries • Financial services: money services, including currency exchange, money transfer, prepaid cards, virtual and digital services • Cryptocurrency: cryptocurrencies, crypto exchanges, tokens and other crypto assets | See Section 8.2.1.2 of the Klarna Network Rules, including: • Financial support services: financial advice, debt collection, insurance • High-value collectibles and secondary market trading • In-game purchases • Licensed firearms and weapons-related services • Alcohol, tobacco and CBD products • Regulated healthcare and pharmacy services • Travel and events |
| What you provide | An industry-specific questionnaire (per business type) A sample list of your Partners in that business type | An industry-specific questionnaire (per business type) |
| What Klarna does | Reviews the questionnaires Reviews a sample of your Partners Runs live control review sessions with your team | Reviews the questionnaires |
| Live control review sessions | Required | Not required |
| Possible outcomes | Approved, conditionally approved, or declined | Approved in most cases. Klarna may ask for more information if risk indicators come up. |
| After approval | Ongoing monitoring of your Partner portfolio | Ongoing monitoring of your Partner portfolio |
Enablement steps for Elevated Financial Crime Risk business types
For these business types, Klarna runs a full enablement review. The structure is the same whatever the business type or market. Only the questions specific to each business type change, so you know what to expect and all Acquiring Partners are assessed in the same way.
Step 1: Request and scoping
Tell your Klarna contact which business types and markets you want to enable. We confirm the scope and send you the questionnaires you need.
Step 2: Questionnaires
You complete:
- The Acquiring Partner diligence form, covering your licenses, Partner portfolio, AML/CTF and sanctions framework, PEP and adverse media screening, transaction monitoring and risk indicators, if Klarna doesn't already have a current version
- A high-risk questionnaire for each business type you have requested, for example licensing and jurisdiction checks, enhanced due diligence and business-type-specific controls
Step 3: Partner portfolio and sample review
Send us a list of the Partners you have, or plan to have, in each requested business type. For each Partner, include the legal entity name, website URL, country of registration, assigned MCC and expected 12-month volume.
Klarna chooses which Partners to review using a risk-based method. You don't pick the sample. We check each selected Partner against independent sources, for example its business activity, licenses, ownership, website and adverse media.
Step 4: Live control review sessions
After reviewing your questionnaires and samples, we hold live sessions with your team. These let us resolve open questions together and see your controls in action through live system demonstrations and real-case walkthroughs. We assess each control on what is demonstrated during the session, so we encourage you to bring the subject matter experts who run these processes day to day, along with the people accountable for them.
The following table sets out the five areas we cover, regardless of business type. We also share it in advance so you can bring the right people and evidence and avoid follow-up requests.
| # | Area | What we look at | Why we look at it |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | How you onboard Partners | How you check a new Partner before it goes live, including: • Onboarding process documentation and consistency • Enhanced Due Diligence (EDD) triggers for high-risk business types and MCCs • Website compliance screening • Adverse media checks at entity and UBO level, sole trader and new company controls | Regulatory standards: Assurance on compliance with customer due diligence, enhanced due diligence for higher-risk customers, and PEP screening Klarna Network Rules: Chapter 8; Sections 9.1(2) and 9.4.3.1(1), (2), (5) |
| 2 | How you monitor transactions and report suspicious activity | How your monitoring covers Klarna transactions, including: • Live transaction monitoring system coverage • Transaction laundering typology rules • How you handle transaction alerts, for example L1→L2 alert escalation and SLAs • Suspicious Activity Report (SAR) and Suspicious Transaction Report (STR) filing triggers • Klarna disputes and request for information (RFI) feed integration • Behavioral baselining protocols, that is how you define typical activity for each Partner so you can spot anything atypical | Regulatory standards: Assurance on ongoing transaction monitoring and suspicious transaction reporting Klarna Network Rules: Sections 9.1 and 9.4.3.1(4), (6) |
| 3 | How you manage Partners over time | How often you perform lifecycle governance on your Partners in these business types, including: • Periodic Know Your Business (KYB) refresh • Customer complaint routing • SLAs for Klarna-flagged issues • Partner risk team resourcing and independence, and escalation paths • How issues are escalated to compliance | Regulatory standards: Assurance on ongoing due diligence throughout the business relationship Klarna Network Rules: Sections 9.4.3.1(3) and 9.4.4(1), (2) |
| 4 | How your financial crime program is governed | How your board oversees AML program governance, including: • Board-level oversight and risk appetite • Regulatory examination findings and remediation • KYB refresh operational status • Sanctions screening (account-level and daily) | Regulatory standards: Assurance on internal controls, an independent compliance function and senior management oversight Klarna Network Rules: Sections 9.4.3, 9.4.3.1(7), 9.4.3.2 and 9.4.4(3) |
| 5 | Topics specific to the business types you've requested | Risks that are particular to each business type, for example: • Gambling: player fund segregation and responsible gambling controls • Financial services: businesses operating under another business's license (nested entities) and prepaid card controls Klarna specifies beforehand which topics apply to you. | Regulatory standards: Assurance on risk-based approaches, such as coverage of licensing, age-verification and consumer protection laws in the markets where your Partners operate Klarna Network Rules: Chapter 8; Sections 8.2 and 8.2.1 |
Step 5: Decision
When the review is complete, Klarna makes one of the following decisions:
| Outcome | What it means |
|---|---|
| Approved | You can onboard Partners in the approved business types. |
| Conditionally approved | You can onboard Partners in the approved business types, subject to conditions. Examples include restrictions to certain business types or markets, transaction limits, enhanced monitoring, extra Partner-level checks, or fixing gaps by an agreed date. |
| Declined | You can't onboard Partners in the requested business type. We explain why. |
We may also ask for more information before we make a decision.
Enablement steps for Elevated Conduct Risk business types
For these business types, enablement is based on a questionnaire. We don't ask for a sample of your Partners or hold live sessions as standard.
- 1.Notify: Tell your Klarna contact which business types you want to enable and in which markets.
- 2.Questionnaire: Complete the questionnaire for each business type. It covers, for example, license checks, age verification, prohibited-product controls, delivery controls and customer protection, depending on the business type.
- 3.Review: Klarna reviews your answers and keeps them on file as part of our assurance records. In most cases you get confirmation without any further steps.
We keep monitoring Partners in these business types throughout their lifecycle. If we see risk indicators, for example missing licenses or a link to an Elevated Financial Crime Risk business type, we may ask you for more information.
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