Mambu Payments is built around key concepts and objects. Understanding how they relate to each other will help you navigate the API and design your integration.

At the centre is connectivity: Mambu Payments links your application to your partner bank or CSM via connected accounts. From there, you can send and receive payments across bulk, real-time, and RTGS schemes, manage exceptions through investigations, and reconcile transactions against your bank account balances. Counterparties let you model the accounts on of your customers and their partners. VOP adds payee verification on top of that flow. Events and webhooks keep your system in sync as things happen. Environments enable you to develop, test, validate, and run your integration.

Key concepts

1. Partner bank and CSM connectivity

Mambu Payments connects to your partner banks or CSMs, directly, through last-mile connectivity providers, or Swift.

Connected accounts represent the connectivity between a Mambu Payments (formerly Numeral) customer and its partner bank, CSM, or Swift. It can be a bank account holding transactions and balances or a technical account used for bank or payment scheme connectivity-purposes only.

Connected accounts can be accessed in the API and dashboard under Settings > Connectivity > Connected accounts.

2. Payments

Send, receive, and return payments across bulk, real-time, and RTGS payment schemes through partner banks, CSMs, or Swift. Payments include:

• Payment orders are outgoing payment instructions
• Incoming payments are incoming payment instructions
• Returns are outgoing and incoming return instructions

3. Investigations

Manage investigations, including return requests / recalls, claims, and inquiries (also called R transactions):

• Return requests / recalls are requests to return payments received (incoming payments) or payments sent (payment orders)
• Claims include claims for non-receipt and claims for value date correction
• Inquiries are requests for status update related to return requests and claims

Investigations are only available to indirect and direct participants to payment schemes.

4. Cash visibility and reconciliation

Mambu Payments connects to your partner or central bank to retrieve account statements and create balances and transactions.

As transactions are posted on your bank account, Mambu Payments automatically reconciles them with unreconciled payments, based on their respective attributes. Transactions can also be reconciled manually using the Mambu Payments API or dashboard.

The types of payments that can be reconciled are:

• Payment orders
• Incoming payments
• Returns
• Expected payments
• Payment captures

5. Counterparties

Use account holders, external accounts, and internal accounts to manage your customers, suppliers, vendors, and partners and their accounts in Mambu Payments.

6. VOP

Use Mambu Payments to send and respond to payee verification requests and comply with EU's Verification of Payee. Mambu Payments offers a fully-managed VOP service, including registering you in the EPC's EDS and procuring your QWAC PSD2 certificate for you.

7. Events and webhooks

Events are created when an object is created or updated, either by a user using the API or the dashboard or by Mambu Payments. This can be a payment successfully executed or a transaction posted on your bank account.

Mambu Payments uses webhooks to notify your application when an event is created.

8. Environments

To facilitate your API integration developments, tests, and validations, Mambu Payments offers distinct sandbox and production environments.