Merchant of record
The business legally selling to the customer and responsible for the payment, refunds, taxes and disputes.
The merchant of record is the business that legally sells to the customer and is responsible for the transaction, including accepting the payment, handling refunds and disputes, and meeting tax and consumer law obligations. In agentic commerce the agent's operator usually is not the merchant of record; the Agentic Commerce Protocol, for example, states that sellers remain the merchant of record. Knowing who holds this role tells a customer where to turn when an agent's purchase goes wrong.
Agent Minute explains this term on 31 October 2026.
Related terms
Agentic checkoutA checkout an agent completes through a structured API with the seller, instead of operating the seller's website.ChargebackA card scheme process that reverses a card payment back to the cardholder's issuer after a valid dispute.Agentic Commerce Protocol (ACP)An open specification for checkout between buyers, their AI agents and sellers, with delegated payment tokens.Billing errorUnder US Regulation Z, a credit card charge a consumer disputes, such as goods not delivered as agreed.