Black list for consumers

Does it exist?

[tys0n28]

Let me describe the problem. We have had this happen a few times and it just makes me so mad - I'm not sure if anything can be done.

We have a subscription website. So users pay using either PayPal or Yahoo PayDirect and gain access to a subscription area of the website for about $5 / month.

We recently had a user enjoy about 3 weeks of the subscription content, then file a fraud complaint with Yahoo PayDirect saying he wasn't happy with the service and wanted a refund. Was he really unhappy with the service or did he just want his 5 bucks back? There's no way to really know, but the latter is the reason we don't offer refunds typically.

Is there a black list out there of people that do this? Charge their credit cards and then reverse the charges? The credit card companies always side with the consumer, which makes sense in most cases, but that policy allows for this kind of abuse.

So does anyone have any suggestions on what we can do?

Thanks,
Tyson

[Essex_boy]

Be very careful setting something like this up. You may find yourself sued to death.

[Peb0]

Hmmmm....
Not too sure if you can do anything but here's my 2 cents.

If I can assume that you are accurate with your $5 subscription rate and can assume that by a "few times" you mean once or twice for every hundred subscriptions...

It's not worth the effort.

[Phillyrich]

tys0n28, there is a list of people that have chargebacks. First Data has the biggest and you can check against it and refuse to take people that have this sort of history.

[Peb0]

Essex_boy is right...

If I legitimately filed a chargeback on my credit card and another business refused to accept my business ONLY because of that, they're just looking for trouble.

My first comment still stands. Will you refuse 5 customers, just to prevent 1 from possibly scamming you? I don't know about you but I'd choose to have 4 customers paid up and 1 charged back.

[Phillyrich]

Pebo is right you do lose good customers with the black list as your guide. Most webmaster would rather take the hit from the friendly fraud than lose good customers that might have chargedbacked something in the past.

[tys0n28]

Well at the very least, it sounds like I may be able to get this person added to First Data's list. At least that's something.

But it sounds like preventing it in the future might be tough.

[webwoman]

Why would you care for $5?

[tys0n28]

I just used that as an example. We have had $55 charges backed out and the subscription content is actually an online game that you play - similar to Fantasy Football. So once someone pays and gets a team, it really disrupts an entire group of 16 people if someone does this.

[Sunshyn]

How does one go about checking First Data's chargeback list? We had a First Data merchant account, but I can't recall any reference to this service.

I would consider such a check useful for very large sales. We are more likely to refuse a sale when it's large enough that the loss would badly hurt us. It's opposite from what I often hear, but being able to do such a check would give us more reason to accept such a sale than the other way around.

[lgn1]

Fraudulent Chargebacks don't happen very often to us, but we do have a 'Idiot of the Month' for our staff pleasure. At the end of the year, we vote on 'Idiot of the year'. Great fun, gets rid of frustration, and you don't have to worry about getting sued.

Fraulent chargebacks, will qualify you for being and 'idiot', however legimate but stupid and difficult customers ussually win out :)

[Phillyrich]

Sunshyu, I suppose that you have to have a gateway provider that has access to the database. We offer it but I am not sure how we went about obtaining it.

[JuniorOptimizer]

You need to accept the fact the you're powerless over the consumers.

The whole system is set up for the consumer to "win" any dispute with companies, even the illegitimate ones where the consumer is clearly wrong.

You have to accept it and move on. Any battle you get in with the customer will result in complaints to the BBB, the Attorney General, and a Chargeback. They will do this even if they're completely morally wrong.