Forum Moderators: buckworks
1) has the VbV process reduced your conversions and/or shopping cart abandonment? I feel that this could occur because there are extra steps the customer would be required to complete, right?
2) can a customer whose bank is "VbV-ready" opt-out of the VbV process? Is there a limit to the number of times they can do this?
3) do any of you have experience with recurring transactions and what the best way to handle those with VbV would be? We sell a service that people repeatedly re-purchase (at different dollar amounts) with the same credit card so we are wondering how the VbV program would handle that...basically, if we don't want the VbV protection on the recurring transactions, will the bank still authorize the transactions even though we don't know the customers' security PINs?
Thanks!
Excellent questions. I immediately sent them to my VbV/SecureCode provider and personal contact. Here is his response....
1) Regarding Verified by Visa and abandonment...define abandonment. Most eTailers define it as a customer abandoning the checkout process prior to capturing the critical information needed for completing a purchase (credit card type, number, exp date, name on card, billing address, etc...) With Verified by Visa, the authentication process is not triggered until after all of this information has been captured. It occurs at the moment a customer clicks "submit" to complete the purchase. So by that definition, VbV abandonment is non existant. In general, VbV abandonment from the authentication screen is between 2-3 percent. Which is lower than most merchants normal abandonment rates. Basically, it's a non-issue.
2) A customer who's bank is VbV ready, and who has pre-enrolled the cardholder in the program (Activation During Shopping or ADS) can choose to "Enroll Later". It is up to each individual card issuing bank to set the number of times the cardholder can defer enrollment before they are forced to. Typically it is 4 or 5 times.
3) In a recurring transaction situation (subscriptions) merchants are protected on the first transaction by VbV. The first trx in a subscription is typically the one with the highest rate of fraud. If the subsequent subscription trx are performed without the active involvement of thecustomer (ie: they are online and personally approve the trx each month)then VbV cannot be employed. The reason being that by definition, VbV requires the customer to actively participate in the authentication of their identity. Visa does not want the customer providing their PIN/Password to amerchant, that would defeat the purpose of the initiative. So, VbV protectsthe highest risk trx, the first trx, in a series of subscription trxs.However, if the customer is online and executes each subscription payment,then they can be authenticated on every trx.
I am strongly leaning towards implementing this. Should I be worried about VbV "blocking" my transactions in the following scenario? Customers who buy my service end up having their CC info stored...without the VbV info of course. I then run future transactions against this stored info for additional services they buy over time. In this recurring purchases scenario, there are times when customers phone in their orders via customer service. I want to make sure that the customer service rep can successfully complete the tranasaction WITHOUT having to ask the customer for their VbV pin. If someone is enrolled in Verified by Visa, will it absolutely always prompt us to enter their PIN if we are running the transaction on their behalf? If that is the case, and we can't input their PIN, then I guess we can't accept that credit card?
I guess we could seperate our billing system so that our customer service department uses something that isn't VbV-enabled so things are just the way they used to be. Like you said, it is the first transaction that I am most concerned about charge-backs on.
If you are entering the order on behalf of your customer via your website, where VbV has been enabled, then enrolled cardholders credit cards WILL be prompted for an authentication response.
If you must use your website for order entry, you can set up a checkout page sequence that bypasses the VbV step, for internal use only. Visa does not allow this on your external customer site, but for internal order entry use, it should be OK. The assumption is, if the order was authenticated once, future use of the card without VbV will be somewhat safer.
However, VERY IMPORTANT, you will not receive chargeback liability protection, fraud protection, guaranteed payment or a reduced interchange rate on any trxs performed in this manner. It is your liability.
