andnbsp;Most consumers love to buy stuff online. According to Statista, when 2015 ended, nearly 1.2 billion people across the globe had made at least one online purchase. Every 30 seconds, ecommerce generates another $1.2 million in sales. The trend just has more and more people buying items online. According to Juniper research, purchases made online with mobile devices and computers should exceed 125 billions transactions by the end of 2018. While ecommerce is just growing, more and more customers are concerned about credit card fraud and identity theft. Companies are force dto who more and more ways they offer their customers increased protection from theft anf farud.
Businesses also need to protect themselves from consumers who may try to target them or other customers to commit fraud. If you are a merchant, there are things you cna do to proitect yourself from chargebacks and other fraudulent transactions.
Improve Your Bottom Line by Preventing Chargebacks and Other Credit Card Fraud:
- Check photo ID for people using credit cards. Many credit cards now days put a photo of the card holder on the card itself. If there is no photo on the card or if you are concerned that the photo is not the person who is usigmnthe cars, you can ask the customer to show another form of ID. If you are polite and professional, the person will not be offended when you ask dthis and will appreciate that you are just trying to offer them protection from frautulent uage of their credit car If you are really concerned about a credit card transaction, call the company. You should also make sure that all of your employees know to check the customers; signature when making credit card purchases.This is an easy and free way to deter credit card fraud by few stores actually do it.
- Train your stadd to recognize suspicious, shopping behavior. If someone comes into your business and eants to make several large purchases with a card and it is just before you are set to close, you might want to look into it. Often when people are looking to buy something with a credit card that is not theirs.
- For ecommerce transactions, make sure your system verifies the billing zip code. Sometimes people do andnbsp;but gifts online that they have shipped to an address that is not the same as their home address. If there is some other reason the tr ansaction looks suspicious in any way, contact the card holder and ask them. It could be a misunderstanding or you could be offering protection for yourself and the card holder.
- Gve your customers great service. If you get a notice that certain transactions are being contested, contact the customer. For some transactions, there could be a very reasoinable explanation. If they purchased something from you online, ut may look a lot different when it arrives and you may be able to work out the transaction with the person directly. This can offer you some protection from any measures the company takes against you and show your customer know you vakue their business.
- Make sure your customers recognize your name on their bills. If your company has one name on the but has another name that you are “doing business as” (also called “DBA”), you need to tell your customers who purchase items from you with theur cards this. Otherwise they may not recognize the name andnbsp;and repport the transaction as being fraudulent. If you are owned by a parent company, just let cusomers know what the situation is to prevent confusion and other problems later.
Credit card companies take protection from fraud very seriously. If you find you are getting a lot of chargebacks ir customers are contesting a lot of your purchases this can end up really hurting your business. First of all, you lose the money from the sale. The next problem is that the credit card company often charges you a fee. If you have enough of these, you can also really damage your relationship with the company that issued the card. The good news is that you can take steps to protect yourself and your customers from all sorts of credit card fraud.
