Read a counterparty's risk profile and history

When you would do this

Before approving a first payment to someone, when a payment to them is flagged, and periodically for counterparties you pay regularly.

Steps

1. Go to Governance › Counterparty and open the counterparty.
2. Read the risk tier on the header. This reflects screening of their registered addresses.
3. Open Registered Addresses. Each row shows the chain, the address, its status, its risk score, and when it was added.
4. Check the status of the address you are about to pay: new, or known after a completed payment to it.
5. Review their payment history: what you have paid them, when, and on which network.

The Pay screen also surfaces this. When you select a counterparty it shows when you last paid them and how much, so you can sanity-check a new request against the pattern.

How to read it

Risk tier is about the addresses, not about your commercial relationship. A long-standing supplier can acquire a worse tier because an address they use has interacted with something screening dislikes.

A new address is not a red flag on its own. It means no completed payment has gone to it yet. Every legitimate address starts here.

A high risk score with a plausible story still needs a decision from a person. Screening tells you what it found. It does not tell you whether to pay.

No history at all for a counterparty you believe is long-standing usually means someone created a duplicate record. Check for duplicates before paying.

What to expect

Risk information updates as screening runs, so a counterparty's tier can change without you doing anything. See "Ongoing wallet risk monitoring".

Anything you decide should go into the record. If you approve a payment to a counterparty whose tier is poor, resolve the flag with a comment and a document explaining why. That comment is what your auditor reads later, and what protects the person who approved it.

Common problems and what they mean

The tier got worse and nothing changed on your side. Re-screening found something new about an address they use. Look at which address, and consider asking them to receive on a different one.

A counterparty has two records. Someone added them twice, often once as a business and once as an individual. Archive the duplicate rather than deleting history.

An address shows no risk score. It has not been screened yet, or screening could not reach a result. Do not read a blank as a pass.

Their history is empty but you know you have paid them. The earlier payments went to an address now archived, or to a different record.