When a payment processor asks what your business does, it wants a short, accurate account it can check against your website: what you sell, who buys it, how you confirm who those buyers are, and where you ship. For a research-use-only (RUO) supplier, the best description is the plainest one. It names your products the way your site names them, says that you sell to businesses and research buyers, and explains the controls you actually run.
The goal is accuracy, not persuasion. A description that makes your business sound like something else is inaccurate, and it will not match your storefront. If a processor reads an accurate description and decides it cannot support your business, that is its decision to make.
Why processors ask, and what they compare it with
Stripe states that its Know Your Customer obligations require it to collect and maintain information about the businesses that use it, and that regulators and financial partners require this to help prevent abuse of the financial system. When you verify your account, Stripe asks for information about your business, your product and your relationship to the business. It reviews that information for compliance with its services agreement and contacts you if it needs anything else.
Your website is part of the same picture. Stripe's support guidance says your site must show your business name and descriptions of your goods or services, and that these must align with the information you gave Stripe. It also says Stripe checks websites regularly. Stripe's website checklist adds that if it reviews your site and it is not clear what you are selling, it may contact you with recommendations. For a wider view of the process, see how payment processors review a merchant.
In practice, your description is never read on its own. It is read next to your product pages, your policies and your checkout.
The four things your description should answer
What you sell
Describe your products the way your catalog does. If your site lists research compounds, say research compounds. Do not swap in a broader or softer term, such as general lab supplies, if that is not what most of your sales are. Give the reviewer a sense of proportion: which kinds of products make up most of your catalog, and whether you sell anything else, such as lab equipment or documentation services.
State the use restriction plainly: your products are sold for laboratory research use only and are not for human or animal consumption. If you are not sure what that label does and does not mean, start with what research-use-only means.
Who buys
Say who your customers are, for example university labs, contract research organizations, biotech companies or independent research businesses. Say just as clearly who you do not sell to. If you do not sell to consumers, state that, and be ready to show how your site enforces it. Do not describe your buyers more narrowly than your order history supports.
How you verify buyers
Explain the checks a buyer passes before an order ships. That might include a site-entry declaration, a buyer type and credentials check at checkout, a signed research-use statement, and manual review of orders that match certain rules. Describe only the controls you run today. If a control is planned, call it planned. A reviewer can ask to see any control you mention, and a description that overstates your checks is still an inaccurate description. Our guide to verifying business and research buyers covers the checks themselves.
Where you ship
List the countries or regions you ship to and any you exclude. If some destinations need extra checks or are blocked entirely, say so. Stripe's website checklist also lists disclosing any legal or export restrictions that apply to your business, so the description and the site should tell the same story here.
A plain outline you can adapt
A short description usually needs four or five sentences. Fill in this outline with your own facts, and leave out any line that does not apply:
- What: We sell [your product categories, in the same words your site uses] for laboratory research use only. They are not for human or animal consumption.
- Who: Our customers are [your buyer types]. We do not sell to consumers.
- How buyers are verified: Before an order ships, buyers [the checks you run]. Orders that match [your rules] are held for manual review.
- Where: We ship to [your destinations]. We do not ship to [excluded destinations].
- Anything else material: [For example, a second product line or a wholesale channel.]
Use the same wording wherever you describe the business: your account profile, your about page, your terms of sale and any answers to information requests. One consistent version is easier for a reviewer to follow than a fresh version each time.
What to leave out
- Vague names for your products. If a reviewer has to guess what you sell, the description has not done its job.
- Anything about uses or results. Wording that suggests your products are used on people or animals, or that describes what they do, contradicts the research-use-only restriction. The same applies to your site; see claims to remove from a research supply store.
- Promises you cannot back up. Do not say every buyer is verified if some orders skip checks.
- Persuasion instead of facts. Statements about growth, customer reviews or how long you have taken payments elsewhere do not answer the reviewer's question.
- A different industry category. Choose the category that matches what you sell, even if another one looks less likely to draw questions. Our explainer on merchant category codes covers why this matters.
When your business changes
A description is accurate on the day you write it. If you add a product line, start selling to a new kind of buyer, start shipping to new countries or change how you verify buyers, update your account information and your website together. Stripe's support guidance notes that a site that does not list all the products you sell can hold up activation, and that you should update the site with all your products. Treat your written description the same way: when the business changes, the description changes with it.
Keep a dated copy of each version you send. If a processor later asks why your answer differs from an earlier one, you can show what changed in the business and when.
What a good description cannot do
An accurate description makes a review easier to follow. It does not decide the outcome. Stripe and the card networks make their own decisions about which businesses they support, and they can ask for more information at any point. If a processor declines, the right response is to accept the decision, not to rewrite the description until it reads differently.
What a description can do is point to controls you can show. Claddr records buyer checks, signed research-use statements and order holds against each order in a tamper-evident record, so if a reviewer asks how you verify buyers, you can export the evidence rather than describe it from memory. See how Claddr works.
