Step 5 of the Certification Path

How to Pay Your Certification Fee

Three payment paths cover the full fee range, from the $500 small-provider tier through the $150M Sovereign License. Payment is the step after your Entity Audit submission has been reviewed and your documentation has cleared — not before. Once payment clears, your seal license is issued and you are added to the public registry within five business days.

The Payment Sequence

Submit your Intake Inquiry with Entity Audit JSON + PDF attached.
Receive a customized document checklist (within 10 business days).
Submit your supporting documentation.
Documentation is reviewed against your audit. If everything checks out → clearance is issued.
You receive payment instructions by email with the specific path for your tier. Pay using the path below that matches your tier.
Once payment clears: seal license issued, registry listing added within 5 business days, certification anniversary date set.

You do not pay before clearance. If an entity has not received an email from lm.marlowe@pm.me with their specific payment instructions, the payment step has not begun. Pre-payment requests through public links are not honored and are not the active path.

Path 1

Stripe Payment Links

Provider tier · $500 – $15,000 · card payment

For provider-tier fees up to $15,000, Stripe Payment Links are the simplest path. After your documentation clears, the certifying authority emails you the link that matches your annual revenue band. You click it, pay by card, and receive an immediate Stripe receipt. Confirmation flows back to the certifying authority via Stripe webhook.

Tier Links

Tier 1 — Under $500K Revenue

$500 initial · $250 renewal

Initial: https://buy.stripe.com/bJedR92Wr7ylfITf7M2kw01
Renewal: https://buy.stripe.com/bJedR92Wr7ylfITf7M2kw01

Tier 2 — $500K – $2M Revenue

$1,500 initial · $750 renewal

Initial: https://buy.stripe.com/5kQaEX54z4m97cnaRw2kw00
Renewal: https://buy.stripe.com/REPLACE_TIER2_RENEWAL

Tier 3 — $2M – $10M Revenue

$5,000 initial · $2,500 renewal

Initial: https://buy.stripe.com/REPLACE_TIER3_INITIAL
Renewal: https://buy.stripe.com/REPLACE_TIER3_RENEWAL

Tier 4 — $10M – $50M Revenue

$15,000 initial · $7,500 renewal

Initial: https://buy.stripe.com/REPLACE_TIER4_INITIAL
Renewal: https://buy.stripe.com/REPLACE_TIER4_RENEWAL

OPERATOR SETUP — REPLACE PLACEHOLDER URLS. Each REPLACE_TIER* link is a placeholder. In your Stripe Dashboard, create a Payment Link for each tier (Products → Add Product → name it e.g. "MARLOWE Certification Tier 1 Initial", set the price, generate the link). Stripe returns a URL like https://buy.stripe.com/abc123.... Replace each placeholder above with the actual URL. No code changes elsewhere are needed — the links go live the moment they're saved. Total Stripe setup: about 15 minutes once the Stripe account exists.

Stripe's Payment Links are not a custom integration — they are static URLs generated in Stripe's dashboard. They handle card processing, receipts, tax/VAT (if configured), refunds, and dispute handling under Stripe's standard payment terms. No code on this site processes card data; that all happens on Stripe.

Path 2

Wire Transfer / ACH

Provider tier $50,000+ · All Sovereign License gates · Direct bank transfer

For the two largest provider tiers and for all Sovereign License gates, wire transfer (domestic ACH or international SWIFT) is the standard payment method. Card processing exposure and chargeback risk are wrong-shaped for transactions at these sizes — wire is the institutional norm. Wire instructions are issued by email after documentation clearance and include a unique reference code tied to your audit submission.

Applies to These Fees

Track	Tier / Gate	Amount
Provider	Tier 5 — $50M–$250M Revenue	$50,000 initial / $25,000 renewal
Provider	Tier 6 — Over $250M Revenue	$150,000 initial / $75,000 renewal
Sovereign License	Gate I — Initial Jitter Diagnostic	$150,000
Sovereign License	Gate II — Nodal Mapping & Forensic Audit	$1,500,000
Sovereign License	Gate III — Recovery Identification	$5,000,000
Sovereign License	Gate IV — Relator Filing	30% of recovery (statutory)
Sovereign License	Gate V — SPARK Fund Implementation	$500,000
Sovereign License	Gate VI — Manual Override™ Activation	$50,000,000
Sovereign License	Gate VII — Sovereign Full License (3-year)	$150,000,000
Sovereign License	Quarterly Audits Q1/Q2/Q3	$125,000,000 minimum each
Sovereign License	Quarterly Audit Q4 (annual scope premium)	$150,000,000 minimum

Wire Instructions Template

Beneficiary: L.M. Marlowe LLC

Bank Name: [REPLACE — your business bank name]

Bank Address: [REPLACE — bank address]

Account Number: [REPLACE — account number]

Routing (ACH/Domestic): [REPLACE — 9-digit routing]

Wire Routing (Fedwire): [REPLACE — wire routing if different]

SWIFT/BIC (International): [REPLACE — SWIFT code]

Reference (REQUIRED): MARLOWE-EA-[your audit receipt ID] · [tier or gate]

OPERATOR SETUP — DECIDE WHETHER WIRE INFO IS POSTED OR SENT POST-CLEARANCE. Two options. (A) Most secure: Replace the bracketed fields with placeholder text only, and send the actual wire details by encrypted email after clearance. The template stays public, but the live numbers are private. (B) Most transparent: Replace the bracketed fields with the actual account info and let any clearance-passed entity wire directly. Option A is recommended for amounts above $1M and is the standard for institutional-tier counterparties.

Reference code is required on every wire. Without it, the wire is held in suspense until manually traced. The reference format is MARLOWE-EA-YYYYMMDD-HHMMSS-#### (the audit receipt ID generated by the Entity Audit) followed by the tier or gate (e.g. · Tier 5 initial or · Gate I). The audit receipt ID is on the PDF that downloaded with your audit.

Path 3

Email Payment Request

Fallback path · Any tier · For preferred manual processing or alternative payment methods

If you prefer to handle payment outside of card processing or wire transfer — for example, by certified check, cashier's check, or alternative arrangement — email the certifying authority directly. Include your audit receipt ID and your preferred payment method, and a manual payment instruction is returned by reply.

Open Pre-Filled Payment Request Email →

This path is also the fallback if a Stripe Payment Link is not active for your tier yet, or if your bank cannot send a wire to the listed account for any reason. Manual processing typically completes within 5 business days.

What Happens After Payment Clears

Confirmation issued within 2 business days of payment posting (Stripe = immediate; wire = 1–3 business days; manual = 3–5 business days).
Seal license delivered by email. Includes the TRU Geometry™ Seal artwork, your unique certification ID, your effective date, your next-audit due date, and the licensing terms for displaying the seal.
Registry listing added at marloweaudit.com/registry within 5 business days of payment posting.
Anniversary date set. Provider-tier certifications renew annually; Sovereign License entities undergo quarterly audits per the published cadence.

What Payment Does — And What It Does Not Do

To be explicit about the structure of the transaction:

Payment does: compensate the certifying authority for the audit review, documentation verification, registry maintenance, and the licensed use of the TRU Geometry™ Seal for the certification term.
Payment does not: by itself constitute certification. An entity that pays but has not passed the deterministic audit and document clearance is not certified — payment without clearance is held and refunded. Payment is the consideration for the certification work, not the certification itself.
If an audit fails after fee payment: the audit fee is fully refunded, OR — at the applicant's option — held against a revised reapplication within 12 months at no additional fee.
If certification is revoked post-issuance for non-compliance: fees already paid are not refunded; the prior period's certification was valid for the period it was held in good standing.

Refund & Dispute Policy

Audit failure refund: If the audit review finds the entity does not pass either threshold (Sovereign Constant™ or comp ratio), the full fee is refunded within 10 business days, less any wire transfer fees actually incurred.
Voluntary withdrawal: An applicant may withdraw at any point before clearance review begins and receive a full refund minus a $50 processing fee. After clearance review begins, refunds are prorated against the audit work performed.
Stripe disputes: Card payments are subject to Stripe's standard dispute handling. Disputed charges are escrowed by Stripe pending resolution per their terms.
Wire transfer corrections: Wires sent without the required reference code, or to closed accounts, are returned by the receiving bank. Apply with correct reference and account.

Operator Reference — How to Activate This Page

For L.M. Marlowe, certifying authority — the page above is built to be operational with three local changes:

Stripe (15 minutes). Create a Stripe account if not already done (Wyoming LLC + EIN + business bank account = all the documentation required). Add 8 Payment Links: one initial + one renewal per tier 1–4. Copy each URL. Replace each https://buy.stripe.com/REPLACE_TIER* placeholder in the source. (Tiers 5 and 6 do not need Stripe links — they go via wire.)
Wire instructions (10 minutes). Decide Option A (post template, send live details post-clearance) or Option B (post live wire info publicly). Replace the bracketed [REPLACE — ...] fields in the wire template. If choosing Option A, leave the bracketed fields with a sentence directing the reader to await the post-clearance email.
No other changes required. The page is fully wired into the certification path (Step 5 of the intake flow), the nav, and the canonical record. The seal artwork is already in place. The receipt-ID reference format already matches the Entity Audit output.

This operator-reference card is visible to all visitors. If preferred, ask Claude to move it to a separate /admin/payment-setup.html page after the actual links are live.