Escrow, and why it matters

When you stake on Duel, your money never touches our bank account.

We use Stripe's payment authorisation model: the instant you sign a contract, we place a hold on your card for the full stake. That hold sits with Stripe — a regulated payments processor — not with Outset Limited. If a point is missed, we capture the relevant portion and transfer it to the counterparty (or the house, or your nominated beneficiary) per the split you agreed to.

The reasons we chose this path instead of running our own wallet:

1. Solvency risk. A startup going under should not take your stake with it. Stripe's float is ring-fenced from our operating capital.

2. Regulatory scope. Holding customer funds directly would put us into a licensing regime that adds cost and adds nothing for the user.

3. Transparency. The ledger on your dashboard reconciles against real Stripe payment intents. You can verify every cent.

The tradeoff: we pay Stripe fees on every movement (ours and yours). We think it's worth it. The alternative — "trust us, the money is safe" — is exactly the kind of soft commitment Duel exists to replace.