Tag Archives: chargeback

What is “Friendly Fraud” and How Can My Business Handle It?

Friendly fraud can be summed up as an honest mistake: reporting a charge as fraud when a customer did indeed make that purchase.  Often times this happens unwittingly either by another member of the household or by the cardholder themselves long since forgotten. Instead of working with the merchant to obtain a refund, customers file a chargeback with their credit card company, resulting in the bank issuing a refund on the merchant’s behalf although the merchant did not commit a mistake.

Various Reasons for Chargebacks

Whether they claim the product wasn’t delivered or the product didn’t match the proper description of the item, a customer can file a chargeback for these and other reasons. Sometimes customers simply do not know the difference between a return with the merchant and a chargeback from the bank. Other times, virtual shoplifters leverage the chargeback rules in their favor by ordering goods, receiving those goods, and then not paying by disputing the charge also known as chargeback fraud. 

In addition to the cost of the goods, merchants also pay chargeback fees, lose shipping costs, and spend time and money disputing charges. Making up 40 to 80 percent of a business’s losses in fraud total, friendly fraud results in merchants eating the costs.

Minimizing Friendly Fraud Incidents

Merchants can implement several practices in preventing chargebacks including keeping an open line of communication with customers. This will help customers get in touch with the merchant rather than the bank when they need to return a product or service. 

Merchants should also make their billing descriptor easy to identify. The name of your business on a credit card statement should trigger a memory of a legitimate purchase rather than trigger alarm that someone is fraudulently charging goods to a customer’s card.

merchant services refund policyMerchants can display the refund policy on their website outlining the timeline in which the customer must return the product. If merchants offer refunds and cancellations immediately, customers won’t need to resort to filing chargebacks with the bank. Merchants can make it easy for customers to return a product with pre-paid shipping labels. Also, merchants can notify customers of recurring payments to prevent a surprise charge and the resulting call to the bank. 

In addition to using delivery confirmation as a business practice, merchants can also keep a paper trail of all transactions to further inform customers of the details of the purchase. By offering details about the transaction, merchants can help customers recognize the purchase. This practice will dissuade fraudsters with ill intent from pursuing fraudulent purchases from the merchant with the current and future purchases. 

On the front end of the transactions, merchants can collect as much customer data as possible to help keep track of the order history. In this same session, merchants can use a software requiring customers enter their complete credit card information, as well as allowing customers to review the order and then verify the purchase. 

Merchants can also use data to notice trends with repeat offenders of friendly fraud. With heavy doses of data and communication, merchants can make cuts in their friendly fraud costs, as well as improve their relationships with customers.

MasterCard’s Dispute Resolution Initiative

Mastercard is rolling out its new Dispute Resolution Initiative for payment processors and merchants that will bring many changes to how Mastercard chargebacks and transactions are handled.

The initiative, which has a goal of improving chargeback outcomes and efficiency, will likely mean a more consistent process for merchants. The Dispute Resolution Initiative is being rolled out in four phases and began in October 2018 with a final phase rollout scheduled for April 2020. The latest changes went into effect in October 2019.

What Merchants Should Understand

The Mastercard Dispute Resolution Initiative (MDRI) brings modern solutions to payment processing and chargeback resolutions. MDRI puts more responsibility on issuing banks which must collect information from cardholders like a receipt before initiating a dispute which rules that aim to prevent double refunds completely and reduce invalid disputes that are expensive for merchants.

Merchants won’t use Mastercard’s new dispute system, MasterCom, directly. Instead, the payment processor uses it on the merchant’s behalf. Acquirers and issuers will use MasterCom to initiate and respond to every Mastercard chargeback. As a merchant, your processor can submit supporting documentation through the system if you want to fight a chargeback.

The new dispute system is similar to Visa Claims Resolution (VCR) which Visa rolled out in 2018. VCR, a method of simplifying the chargeback process, automated 80% of dispute volume and reduced the average chargeback resolution time from 54 to 23 days.

New Payment Processing and Chargeback Rules

The Dispute Resolution Initiative adds new processes, technology, and rules to automatically validate dispute requests, open new communication channels between merchants and cardholders, and create a central dispute management platform for acquirers and card issuers.

During the first phase of the rollout, Mastercard instituted a new rule that requires issuers to request more information from cardholders to file a Mastercard chargeback for these reasons:

  • Cardholder Does Not Recognize (4863)
  • Cardholder Dispute, Recurring Billing and Digital Goods (4853)
  • Point of Interaction Error (4834)
  • Incorrect Transaction Amount (4831)

Payment Processing Chargeback Resolution CenterFor these reason codes, issuers must get supporting documentation. For disputes over digital goods or recurring transactions, there must be a cardholder email, letter, or expedited transaction dispute form.

By obtaining more information at the beginning of the chargeback process, the goal is to reduce the number of invalid chargebacks.

Mastercard also added a new pre-compliance requirement. Before an issue can be escalated to a compliance case, a pre-compliance case needs to be filed.

During the second phase, Mastercard instituted a new rule that refunds cannot be initiated after a chargeback is reversed or filed. An acquirer cannot use a pre-compliance case to reverse a second refund if credit is issued for a disputed transaction. Acquirers can still recover the money with a new presentment if the time limit allows, through a pre-arbitration case filing if credit is issued after a second presentment, or through collections.

Issuers are now instructed to check for a reversal or refund before a chargeback and accept a second presentment if the transaction is submitted as “Credit Processed.” Always verify if the customer’s bank is involved before filing a refund to avoid a double refund.

Issuers can no longer use the following reason code for a Mastercard chargeback:
Fraudulent Processing of Transactions (4840)

The timeframe to file a chargeback for a Point of Interaction Error (4834) has also been reduced to 90 days from 120 days.

Changes Still Planned

Phase four of MDRI in 2020 will streamline the chargeback process by removing the arbitration or second chargeback cycle. Instead, card issuers can continue disputes with pre-arbitration before escalating to arbitration in case of fraud. This will be similar to the Visa Claims Resolution process.

During the final phase, Mastercard will eliminate the following reason code for a chargeback:

  • Cardholder Does Not Recognize (4863)

Industry Terms: Chargeback

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This is the latest installment in The Official Merchant Services Blog’s Knowledge Base effort. Well we want to make the payment processing industry’s terms and buzzwords clear. We want to remove any and all confusion merchants might have about how the industry works. Host Merchant Services promises: the company delivers personal service and clarity. So we’re going to take some time to explain how everything works. This ongoing series is where we define industry related terms and slowly build up a knowledge base and as we get more and more of these completed, we’ll collect them in our resource archive for quick and easy access. Today’s term is:

Chargeback

Chargeback typically refers to the act of returning funds to a consumer. The action is forcibly initiated by the issuing bank of the card used by a consumer to settle a debt. Essentially what happens is a consumer disputes a transaction, and the credit card company’s bank responds by taking the money back from the Merchant and returning it to the consumer.

Customers dispute charges to their credit card usually when goods or services are not delivered within the specified time frame, goods received are damaged, or the purchase was not authorized by the credit card holder — the latter being the most common reason for a chargeback.

The chargeback mechanism exists primarily for consumer protection. To start a chargeback a consumer will contact their credit card company and ask for a chargeback. The dispute process then begins. During the dispute process he merchant will have to provide proof they rendered service properly. If the merchant can’t provide sufficient evidence, the credit card company debits the transaction amount from the merchant’s account and credits it to the consumer’s account. Additionally, the credit card company charges the merchant a chargeback fee as a penalty.

With each chargeback the issuer selects and submits a numeric reason code. This feedback can help the merchant and acquirer diagnose errors  and improve customer satisfaction. The code also helps the merchant better investigate the transaction in order to find proof during the Dispute Process. Reason codes vary by bank network, but fall in four general categories:

  • Technical: Expired authorization, non-sufficient funds, or bank processing error.
  • Clerical: Duplicate billing, incorrect amount billed, or refund never issued.
  • Quality: Consumer claims to have never received the goods as promised at the time of purchase.
  • Fraud: Consumer claims they did not authorize the purchase or identity theft.

 

For transactions where the original invoice was signed by the consumer, the merchant may dispute a chargeback with the assistance of the merchant’s acquiring bank. The acquirer and issuer mediate in the dispute process, following rules set forth by the corresponding bank network or card association. If the acquirer prevails in the dispute, the funds are returned to the acquirer, and then to the merchant.

The merchant’s acquiring bank accepts the risk that the merchant will remain solvent over time, and thus has an incentive to take a keen interest in the merchant’s products and business practices. Reducing consumer chargebacks is crucial to this endeavor. To encourage compliance, acquirers may charge merchants a penalty for each chargeback received. Payment service providers, such as PayPal, have a similar policy. In addition, Visa and MasterCard may levy severe fines against acquiring banks that retain merchants with high chargeback frequency. Acquirers typically pass such fines directly to the merchant. Merchants whose ratios stray too far out of compliance may trigger card association fines of $100 or more per chargeback.

For More Information

To find out more about Chargebacks and to gain some Chargeback Tips, be sure to CLICK HERE and read The Official Merchant Services Blog entry from January 9, 2012.