Delegated payment
Giving an agent a payment token limited by an allowance, such as amount, currency, merchant and expiry.
Delegated payment is the pattern of giving an agent a payment credential it can use only within limits, instead of the customer's raw card details. In the Agentic Commerce Protocol, the Delegate Payment specification lets an agent obtain from a payment provider a token tied to an allowance, which constrains maximum amount, currency, expiry and merchant, with risk signals supplied at tokenisation. The provider enforces the allowance, so the limit holds even if the agent misbehaves.
Agent Minute explains this term on 9 January 2027.
Related terms
Spend limitA cap on how much an agent may pay, enforced by the system that executes the payment, not by the agent.Agent tokenA payment credential issued for use by a specific agent, which can be limited and revoked without replacing the card.Payment tokenA substitute value that replaces a card number, usable only in a defined domain such as one device or merchant.Agentic checkoutA checkout an agent completes through a structured API with the seller, instead of operating the seller's website.