Methodology

How Merchant Patrol validates public deployment results

Scope

Merchant Patrol standard product intentionally validates only public observable deployment results. It does not access client admin, customer data, orders, payment records, or private backend state.

Public observable evidence

Evidence may include public HTML, rendered public content, public schema, canonical URL, HTTP status, redirect chain, robots/noindex signals, policy pages, and public product availability or price signals when observable.

Status engine vs rule engine

The status engine answers whether Merchant Patrol can validate a target. The rule engine answers what public observable risks were found within the stated scope.

Baseline, before, and after

Before/after proof depends on a valid comparison basis. Missing before evidence lowers the outcome ceiling and must not be converted into a clean result.

Gate A and Gate B

Gate A validates pre-cutover public or staging results where available. Gate B validates post-cutover public results such as final URL, redirect, PageType, identity, canonical, HTTP state, and old-domain residue.

Evidence gaps

UNKNOWN, UNOBSERVABLE, and NOT_COMPARABLE states are preserved. AI or rendering layers must not upgrade them to PASS.

AI Action Proof boundary

For AI-assisted public changes, Merchant Patrol validates the public result after the action. It does not certify the AI system, does not claim legal compliance, and does not guarantee platform approval.

Non-guarantees

Merchant Patrol does not guarantee Google Merchant Center approval, legal compliance, complete site correctness, private backend correctness, order correctness, payment correctness, or platform approval.