# Overview

The Merchant Monitoring API allows you to monitor merchant domains and their business web presence, assess trustworthiness and receive ongoing alerts when meaningful changes are detected.

It is designed for platforms and merchants that need reliable, provider-backed intelligence to support onboarding, risk assessment, compliance workflows, or ongoing monitoring.

### What Merchant Monitor Does

Merchant Monitoring provides two core capabilities:

* **Ongoing Monitoring** (notifications via webhook) of domains on a scheduled basis
* **Web Presence Check** that evaluates trust signals and returns a recommendation

**IMPORTANT:** Once a domain is registered, monitoring begins immediately. An initial Web Presence Check is attempted asynchronously. In some cases, this check may not complete successfully (for example, due to provider timeouts or incomplete data). When this occurs, the verification can be retried using the Manually Trigger Domain Verification Check endpoint.

### High-Level Lifecycle

*Below is a diagram that explains, at a high-level, how the Merchant Monitoring API works*

{% @mermaid/diagram content="flowchart TD
A\[Domain Registered] --> B\[Monitoring Starts Immediately]
B --> C\[Initial Web Presence Check Triggered]
C --> D\[Verification Processing]
D -->|Completed| E\[Recommendation Available]
D -->|Failed or Timed Out| F\[Recommendation Pending]
F --> G\[Manual Verification Retry]
G --> E
B --> H\[Scheduled Monitoring Continues]
H --> I\[Notifications Emitted on Changes]" %}

### Consuming Results

Domain Monitor supports two complementary integration patterns:<br>

#### Pull-Based (API)

Use the API to retrieve the current state of a domain, including its latest recommendation and timestamps.

{% content-ref url="/pages/xSQJOlI5zM6FyqaQbvS9" %}
[Retrieving Domain Data](/merchant-monitoring-api/retrieving-domain-data.md)
{% endcontent-ref %}

#### Push-Based (Webhooks)

Request a webhook endpoint to receive alerts when monitoring detects meaningful changes or events.

{% content-ref url="/pages/2fUaGzo0uNthr7ABf6zE" %}
[Webhook - Monitoring Notifications](/merchant-monitoring-api/webhook-monitoring-notifications.md)
{% endcontent-ref %}

### Getting Started

To begin integrating with Merchant Monitoring, start by registering your first domain and reviewing the implementation guidelines.

{% content-ref url="/pages/GdUjgLso4DLAKsAq5r3i" %}
[Implementation Guidelines](/merchant-monitoring-api/implementation-guidelines.md)
{% endcontent-ref %}


---

# Agent Instructions: Querying This Documentation

If you need additional information that is not directly available in this page, you can query the documentation dynamically by asking a question.

Perform an HTTP GET request on the current page URL with the `ask` query parameter:

```
GET https://docs.payshield.ai/merchant-monitoring-api/overview.md?ask=<question>
```

The question should be specific, self-contained, and written in natural language.
The response will contain a direct answer to the question and relevant excerpts and sources from the documentation.

Use this mechanism when the answer is not explicitly present in the current page, you need clarification or additional context, or you want to retrieve related documentation sections.