Your Chargeback Rate Is Too High: How to Bring It Down

• Visa (VAMP): fraud reports plus disputes, divided by settled transactions. Since 1 April 2026 a merchant is excessive at 1.5% or more with at least 1,500 fraud reports and disputes in a month, in the US, Canada, Europe, Asia Pacific and Latin America.
• Mastercard (Excessive Chargeback Program): chargebacks this month divided by transactions last month. A merchant is flagged from 1.5% with at least 100 chargebacks, and treated as high excessive from 3% with at least 300.
• Your provider's limit: many acquirers set a lower limit of their own and act before the scheme lines, so check your agreement.

The ratio compares this month's disputes with a month of transactions, so a drop in sales can push it up even when disputes stay flat. Visa also counts reported fraud, not only chargebacks. Work out your own figure the way your provider does before you decide how serious it is.

• The customer does not recognise the name on their statement.
• Slow delivery or fulfilment, especially on pre-orders.
• Subscription renewals without a reminder or an easy way to cancel.
• Genuine fraud getting through weak authentication.
• Refunds that are slower or harder to get than a chargeback.

• Refund before the dispute: chargeback alerts let you refund a case before it becomes a chargeback, so it no longer counts as a dispute in Visa's ratio. A fraud report the bank has already filed still counts.
• Fight friendly fraud with evidence: under Visa's Compelling Evidence 3.0, if a card-absent fraud claim matches at least two earlier undisputed purchases by the same customer on qualifying data such as IP address or device ID, the claim can be stopped and the fraud report may be excluded from Visa's ratio.
• Make your descriptor recognisable and show it on the receipt.
• Send renewal reminders and let customers cancel without contacting support.
• Use 3-D Secure and fraud rules on the segments that actually cause losses, not on every order.

It usually escalates in steps: a warning, then fines passed on from the card schemes, a reserve or delayed payouts, and finally termination. A merchant terminated for excessive chargebacks can be added to Mastercard's MATCH list, which most acquirers check before boarding anyone.

Do not wait until the account is closed to look for an alternative. A merchant who applies while still processing, with a clear explanation and a falling trend, is in a far stronger position than one who applies after termination.

Underwriters look at the trend and the explanation, not just the number. A spike with a documented cause that has since been fixed reads very differently from a rate that has sat high for months with nothing done about it. Bring three to six months of statements and a short note on what caused the disputes and what you changed.

Acquipayer is not a payment provider. We match businesses with a difficult chargeback history to payment providers that consider that profile, through one online application. Final approval and terms are always the provider's decision.

• Add your business details, volumes and recent chargeback figures once.
• We match you with a provider that accepts your history and your industry.
• Your account is prepared with the provider, so you keep processing instead of starting over.