Forum Moderators: buckworks
It's insane. PayPal can't verify all addresses and neither can my merchant account. I've tried calling the card issuing companies but many of them can't verify the address either. Only American Express can verify a few countries.
Anyone else in this same boat? Any solutions?
If the AVS says "No Match" for a foreign address, I normally void the transaction, since it is not likely they are using an American-bank-issued card.
I use MaxMind to see what kind of fraud probability comes up (like, where's the ip address in relationship to the billing address).
I do a search on the person's name and/or their email address. Surprising what you can find. For instance, I just had a guy order a lot of the same widget from Saudi Arabia. I felt suspicious immediately, but I googled his name, and he actually did a dissertation on widget science and got some of his degrees in widgetology from the university he is asking the widgets to be shipped to. It is not a high demand widget, either.
If I still don't feel satisfied, I ask the customer to give me the customer service number off the back of the card. Some people get insulted and they won't. Others just don't respond. The ones who give me the number, I don't usually call it, just send them the stuff. I figure they wouldn't give me the number if they were frauds.
What people buy from me determines how suspicious I am. Certain items just seem to attract frauds.
I haven't had a chargeback since taking these steps, no evil eye, and I ship to many foreign countries, but I feel uncomfortable with this "system." It is still risky. And I also feel that I sometimes alienate customers by asking for the customer service phone number, even though I have a statement that I will do so all on international cards. But no one ever reads that.
I sure wish they would come up with something easier. If we were using WorldPay, would they verify these cards better?
AVS with worldpay works fine for UK - IIRC it checks CVV and card issue country for many international cards, but it doesn't do address / postcode checks on most international cards.
if a transaction comes through with AVS not matched, you can request a code 10 check - simply email worldpay and they'll check it - can take a couple of days for some cards / countries.
worldpay also includes verified by visa / mastercard securecode - these are equivalent to chip and pin, so if you get a transaction that's authenticated by VbV / MCSC, you are protected from the "i didn't place that order" type of chargeback.
the downside to VbV / MCSC is that it's new and not all cards are enrolled yet. once people have got used to chip and pin, maybe the card issuers will push VbV / MCSC a bit more .........
Sends away anyone that is not serious about purchase.
-ABertone
