How PayCanary Works

PayCanary is a Stripe risk monitoring service. We track the same signals Stripe uses to evaluate your account health — dispute rate, refund rate, volume patterns, and compliance flags — and make them visible in a way Stripe's own dashboard does not.

The core problem we solve: Stripe does not give you a risk score. They do not tell you how close you are to a freeze. They do not alert you when your dispute rate is trending toward the threshold. You find out something is wrong when payouts stop. PayCanary gives you the information to act before that happens.

The service includes three layers: a free health check for instant risk assessment, paid monitoring subscriptions for ongoing tracking and alerts, and crisis response advisory for merchants whose accounts are already frozen. Each layer builds on the previous one.

PayCanary's risk score is deterministic. No AI, no black box, no proprietary model you cannot inspect. The formula is published and you can reproduce the math yourself:

The weights reflect the relative importance of each signal in Stripe's risk evaluation. Dispute rate carries the heaviest weight (40%) because it is the primary trigger for account actions. Refund rate (25%) is the secondary signal. Volume spikes (20%) catch the pattern changes that trigger automated reviews. Keyword flags (15%) cover compliance signals — selling in restricted categories, using flagged terms in product descriptions.

We chose a deterministic formula deliberately. When your business is at risk, you need to understand exactly why your score is what it is and exactly what will move it. An AI model that says "your risk is high" without explaining why is not useful when you need to make immediate decisions. With our formula, you can trace every point of your score back to a specific metric and a specific action that will change it.

The score ranges from 0 (no risk signals) to 100 (critical risk across all dimensions). A score below 30 is healthy. Between 30-60 needs attention. Above 60 is the danger zone where account actions become likely.

On paid plans, PayCanary processes Stripe webhook events — disputes, refunds, and account changes — the moment they fire. A 15-minute backstop cycle also pulls your latest Stripe data, recalculates all four components of the score, checks for threshold proximity, and evaluates whether any metric has moved into a new risk band.

The combination is intentional. Real-time webhooks catch critical events like new disputes instantly, while the 15-minute sync ensures nothing slips through the cracks. You see changes as fast as Stripe generates them, with a reliable periodic sweep to maintain accuracy.

When a threshold is approaching — say your dispute rate is trending toward 0.6% and accelerating — you get an alert via email and (on Protect and Shield plans) via the dashboard. The alert includes your current metrics, the trajectory, and specific recommended actions to reverse the trend before it becomes a problem.

For merchants who are not ready to connect their Stripe account, the free health check gives you a one-time risk score based on manually entered metrics. No Stripe permissions needed. It takes 30 seconds and gives you a snapshot of where you stand.

Watch (Free) — Risk score, basic alerts, weekly industry digest, and the free diagnostic. This is for merchants who want visibility into their account health.

Respond ($249/month) — Everything in Watch plus full monitoring, case management, Fight-or-Fold Advisor, evidence builder, communication templates, and Radar Health Audit. For merchants who want actionable guidance and dispute tools.

Resolve ($749/month) — Everything in Respond plus evidence auto-submission to Stripe, Transaction Vault, e-signature authorization, and multi-account monitoring. For merchants where a freeze would be business-threatening.

Crisis response is for merchants whose Stripe accounts are already frozen, held, or terminated. It is not a subscription feature — it is a one-time advisory engagement (included free for Shield plan subscribers).

The process starts with an AI-guided intake that classifies your freeze: what type of hold (payout hold, full freeze, or termination), what triggered it, how much is locked, your current metrics, and what communication you have already had with Stripe. This classification determines the severity and the SLA for your action plan delivery.

From the assessment, PayCanary builds your action plan. This is a detailed, custom document, not a template. It includes: how to structure your appeal to Stripe, what evidence to gather and submit, specific remediation steps to address the root cause, how to communicate with customers during the freeze, contingency plans if the freeze extends, and a follow-up schedule.

The action plan is delivered within minutes. Your recovery agent monitors the case and follows up every 48 hours to adapt the strategy as your situation evolves.

Learn more about crisis response →

You do not need to connect your Stripe account to get started. The free health check works with manually entered metrics — you type in your dispute rate, refund rate, and volume data, and get your risk score immediately. No OAuth, no API keys, no permissions.

For paid monitoring plans, automated data access via Stripe Connect OAuth is coming in a future release. When available, it will use read-only access. PayCanary will never create charges, modify your settings, or move funds. We are a monitoring service, not a payment processor.

PayCanary is built for Stripe merchants who cannot afford to lose their payment processing. That includes:

SaaS companies where recurring revenue depends on Stripe staying active. A freeze does not just stop new sales — it stops renewals, which destroys MRR and spikes churn.

E-commerce businesses running ad-driven funnels where a checkout outage means wasted ad spend and lost customers who never come back.

Agencies and platforms processing on behalf of clients, where a freeze on the platform account affects every client underneath it.

Marketplaceswith Connect accounts, where dispute rates from sub-merchants can affect the platform's overall health.

Any business that has experienced a freeze before and never wants to be caught off guard again.

If your Stripe volume is under $5K/month and you have no dispute history, the free health check is probably all you need. PayCanary's paid plans make sense when the cost of a freeze — lost revenue, held payouts, customer churn — significantly exceeds the monthly subscription.

Transparency matters. Here is what we do not do and what we are not:

We would rather you understand our limitations upfront than discover them during a crisis. PayCanary gives you information, alerts, and expert guidance. What you do with that information is your decision. We make you informed — we do not make you invincible.

Ready to check your risk? Start with the free Stripe health check. Thirty seconds, no account connection required.