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Even if you manage to keep your chargebacks below the 1/2 – 1% threshold, any chargeback claims – whether remedied or not – take up precious time researching what happened. I’m sure there are other ways you’d rather spend your time (like focusing on new sales). Continue reading "Preventing Chargebacks"

To keep your chargeback ratio in check you have to take a proactive role. You can actually prevent chargebacks from escalating – and counting towards your monthly allotment.

The most common categories for chargebacks include point-of-sale errors, customer disputes, and fraud – and within these categories are a multitude of possible reasons. Understanding the reasons provides insight into how you can keep chargebacks in the “soft” phase from becoming full-blown chargebacks.

Let’s take a look at the possible remedies for common chargeback claims, along with the reason codes assigned by Visa and MasterCard. Continue reading "Remedies for Chargebacks"

While Visa and MasterCard don’t approve merchant accounts, they do hold all the cards – pardon the pun – when it comes to setting chargeback ratios.

Chargeback ratios are calculated by dividing your monthly sales by the number of chargebacks or the total dollar amount of the total chargebacks registered in any given month – or both. You can take proactive steps towards facilitating approval of your merchant account and receiving a fair chargeback ratio – which in general is 1%.

Make sure that you provide your bank with as much detailed and specific information as possible, including: Continue reading "Chargeback Ratios … the Unwritten Rules"

What’s a Chargeback?

A “chargeback” is more than a buzzword. A chargeback happens when a customer disputes a charge you’ve made on his or her credit or debit card. The chargeback usually happens after customers get their billing statement in the mail. And many times they’re quick on the draw – meaning they don’t call the merchant to try to figure out the problem before calling their bank. Continue reading "The Chargeback Cycle in Plain English"

Even if you’ve never been on the dreaded Terminated Merchant File (also known as MATCH) list, you need to take measures to ensure that you don’t end up on it.

How? For starters, rethink whom you do business with. Signing up with the wrong processor greatly increases your chance of landing on the MATCH file, especially for incidental reasons like fee discrepancies. Continue reading "How to Stay Off the MATCH File"