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Disputes and fraud

A dispute is the result of a customer contacting their bank or credit card company about a charge to their debit or credit card account that they are contesting. The dispute and its related information is then made available to the merchant, who will have the option to represent the charge and win the case. This process is known as dispute resolution. If the merchant is unable to represent the charge, the card issuer will typically rescind the sale and add fees on top of it. This process is called a chargeback.

So, how is fraud related to this?

Here are some of the reasons that a customer might use to open a dispute case with their card issuer:

  • Duplicate orders
  • Incorrect charge amount
  • Service(s) not provided
  • Product(s) not as described or defective

However, a common reason — when a customer makes a purchase, then claims they didn’t — is widely referred to as fraud, and can be classified as friendly or criminal.

Friendly fraud

This is usually buyer’s remorse or forgetfulness — maybe the customer decided they really didn’t need that subscription, or simply forgot they signed up. It’s not always intended maliciously. A customer simply wants their money back, and they’ve taken measures with their bank to get it.

Criminal fraud

The intention behind criminal fraud is the opposite of friendly. Someone wants to get something for free, or are after your money, and they are pursuing it in underhanded ways.

What Rebilly can do

We provide these tools:

  • Risk scoring - to spot potential fraud before it happens.
  • Device fingerprinting.
  • Managing blocklists - to stop known offenders from generating more transactions.
  • Recording disputes - to manage your chargeback ratios and automate canceling subscriptions and dispute handling.
  • Automating the dispute process - to save you time and human errors.
  • Managing evidence - to help you win disputes.