Editorial standards.

§1 · Sourcing standards

Every program review draws from at least three independent sources: (1) the program's own affiliate-terms page or network listing, (2) the program's regulator filings where they exist (Companies House, FCA register, FINRA BrokerCheck, CFTC Form 8-T, etc.), (3) verified payout-experience signals — Trustpilot threads, Reddit first-hand reports, aggregator reviews like wecantrack and AffMaven. Where we paraphrase, we say so; where we cite a number, we link to the source it came from.

Affiliate-program base_payout values cite the math directly — typical subscription value × commission % projected over 12 months. No "up to" ceilings. The realistic tier, not the marketing tier.

§2 · Conflict of interest policy

Editorial and commercial operate under independent reporting lines. Programs cannot view their ranking position before publication or request changes pre-publish. The above-the-fold disclosure stripe on every page documents the affiliate relationship; the "¶ affiliate · compensated · does not influence rank" caption appears on every program card. No "sponsored placement" exists in the rubric.

If an editor or fact-checker has a direct financial relationship with a program they would review (held shares, prior employment within 12 months, family employed by the program), the review is reassigned. The exception is noted in the per-review editor_notes annex.

§3 · Corrections process

Found something wrong? Write to editorial@fintechpays.com. Corrections publish at the URL of the affected page within 5 business days of verification, with a dated change-log entry appended below the byline. The page's lastReviewedAt bumps to the correction date.

Material corrections (those that change a program's rank, grade, or flag status) are also logged in the per-program editorNotes audit trail with the date and the editor who made the change.

§4 · Re-verification cadence

Every program is re-verified on a 90-day cycle. If a payout-reliability complaint surfaces between sweeps, the reliability_factor can drop sooner; the change publishes the same day with the dated editor_note.

Programs flagged as defunct remain in the live comparison table for 30 days after the flag date, then move exclusively to /defunct/. Their original review pages stay accessible at the same URL with a "defunct as of {date}" stamp at the top.

§5 · Change log

2026-05-18 · v3.2 lock + first batch publish (10 programs, prop-trading × US).
2026-05-21 · v1 EPC formula spec opened to public methodology page.
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