[glossyscr]

I just checked the prohibited businesses https://stripe.com/de/prohibited-businesses

I am fine with most of them being prohibited but at some points it's getting quite restricted:

1. Virtual currency that can be monetized, re-sold or converted to physical or digital products or services or otherwise exit the virtual world

4. Sexually-oriented or pornographic products or services

9. Engaging in deceptive marketing practices (here: who decides what is 'deceptive')

14. Age verification

15. Age restricted products or services (which are the most products/services)

50. Centralized travel reservation services or travel clubs

[zrail]

Most of these are from Stripe's partner banks, and/or they've proven to be exceptionally prone to fraud and chargebacks.

[ianhawes]

With regards to adult content, the perception is that chargebacks would be higher, but in reality this is mostly a relic of the late 90's when credit cards were first accepted online. Porn pioneered the infinite continuity ("recurring subscriptions until you die") that is incredibly widespread nowadays.

At the moment, there are few non-merchant account ways to legally accept payments for adult content. They include such companies with terrible APIs/websites like: CCBill, Epoch and Verotel. They've successfully lobbied Visa & MasterCard to give them exemptions to provide "IPSP" services for "high-risk" adult content. In reality, working with them is probably the biggest risk. They often enforce arbitrary 30/60/90 day payment holds, require 10-20% reserves, and shut down accounts with no warning and withhold the entire amount processed indefinitely.

I'd like to see Stripe continue to do innovative things in the payments space and work with their payment partners to allow adult-content, at the very least with per-account authorization. The status-quo has been set by Ron Cadwell & CCBill: We will keep your money indefinitely, provide an awful API, and require 'hosted payment forms' (with no custom CSS; terrible UX) because no one is allowed to compete with us.

Patrick, the ball is in your court.

[ad_hominem]

> Patrick, the ball is in your court.

Don't hold your breath. In private emails Patrick deferred to banks'/processors' judgment on these matters.

[toomuchtodo]

Are there any non-Stripe processors you'd recommend for adult content?

[edoceo]

ccbill handled it for our adult product

[toomuchtodo]

Thanks! I was hoping it wasn't going to be ccbill, but that's just how it goes.

[waffle_ss]

Which in turn is inherited from top-down pressure from the federal gov't[1], who are discriminating against certain categories of business purely ideologically.[2]

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Choke_Point

[2]: http://oversight.house.gov/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/Staff-...

[zrail]

Sure, but you have to play the hand you're dealt, especially when the dealer is the Federal government.

[smarx007]

From https://stripe.com/atlas/faq#Do-I-have-to-use-Stripe:

Do I have to use Stripe?

No, but we hope you will!

[kalms]

Seriously? Sexually-oriented services excludes a lot of legitimate, serious businesses. Seems fairly simple minded to me, but maybe that's the European in me speaking.

[tommoor]

I'm sure it's a fraud / charge-back thing.. If you want to run 'riskier' businesses then you need your own merchant account. Although I agree i'm sure there are a few relatively straight-laced buisnesses that unwittingly end up in that bucket!

[kalms]

It makes sense, still.. Smells like censorship, when they put it in writing like that.

[superuser2]

It's not puritanism so much as risk management.

Spouse sees credit card charge for something sexual, questions it. Consumer is backed in do a corner. What do they do? Chargeback.

[Fede_V]

If something can be described as 'maybe' deceptive, than it probably is deceptive. I don't mean this flippantly - playing cute with being deceptive is not really helpful to customers.

[cookiecaper]

Sure, but any business with a marketing department is "maybe deceptive", so it really just becomes a question of "how deceptive is too deceptive".

[pbhjpbhj]

"Deception" means "purposefully misleading" - you can market products without being deceptive, though I'll accept it seems to happen very rarely.

[jessaustin]

Thanks for posting this. I am curious about the first item:

1. Virtual currency that can be monetized, re-sold or converted to physical or digital products or services or otherwise exit the virtual world

Would this include a digital service for which the user might pre-pay? I.e., the service charges $1 every time one uses it, but for convenience's sake one can pre-pay $20. If one decides not to use the service anymore, one can request and receive an immediate refund.

I can see why a payment provider might wish to prevent such an arrangement, but it isn't clear to me that this rule does prevent it.

[onewaystreet]

This is standard boilerplate for most payment services.

[ashmud]

> 15. Age restricted products or services (which are the most products/services)

Wouldn't you need to be the age of majority to use Stripe at all?

[notahacker]

Any cc processor has to worry about age restricted products or services using "Enter your credit card details here" to do their ID checks, especially since that is often combined with dark patterns that downplay the fact there's a charge associated with that. And age-restricted products tend to come with a whole host of other liability issues which they probably don't want connected to Stripe-registered US shell companies.

[superuser2]

It also doesn't make that much sense, considering that 15-17 year olds are regularly issued debit cards for checking accounts (though the parent is also usually a joint account owner). AFAIK nothing in the Visa/MC network has "Birthdate" field.

[junto]

Would this include cinema tickets to R rated movies?

[adamt]

Note in there are a lot of prepaid cards (that can be mastercard/visa cards) that focus on children.

E.g. Osper (https://osper.com/) in the UK is a pre-paid Mastercard that targets 8-18 year olds.

[redka]

Bear in mind this is not a complete list. They can also arbitrarily decide they don't like you even if your business isn't explicitly mentioned on the list and shut down your account even if you had zero chargebacks and zero refunds made.

[bambax]

This list is almost poetic, it folds onto itself several times, and includes

Illegal products or services

in position... 36!

[georgehotelling]

> Age restricted products or services

Doesn't this cover any website that collects personal information, since the Children's Online Protection Act prohibits that for people under the age of 13?

[dragonwriter]

The Children's Online Protection Act (COPA) was struck down as unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. Are you thinking of the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA)?

[georgehotelling]

Thank you, yes, it's COPPA.

[edpichler]

Each country has his particular prohibited items. Check USA prohibited items, it's a lot more better on this regard.

[ben174]

> who decides what is 'deceptive'

Stripe does. No one is entitled to use their service. It's their decision.

[JoshTriplett]

> 9. Engaging in deceptive marketing practices (here: who decides what is 'deceptive')

If you have to ask whether you're being deceptive, or the answer depends on who decides, you're doing something horribly wrong.

[Someone1234]

Except I could argue that most major company's sales pages are deceptive. I mean just look at cellular or cable services in the US, find me ANY that isn't being deceptive in one way or another.

Heck I'd even argue that Google Fiber's page has several statements and claims which are suspect.

[JoshTriplett]

> I mean just look at cellular or cable services in the US, find me ANY that isn't being deceptive in one way or another.

And cellular and cable companies are some of the most hated in the US, not least of which for deceptive practices.