Forum Moderators: buckworks
Summary
I would like to know what the maximum amount of time that can go by before I bank contacts you to request a chargeback from the transaction date?
Details
A few weeks ago we had our first fraudulent transactions through our website, at first we didn't know and were generally excited about a large order. Basically what happened was that an order for several thousands pounds was put through and a dispatch address that was not valid was given (we only ship to uk), the phone number was also invalid, when our courier couldn't ship goods we had them returned. Next contact customer by email and we get the story that they are now back in Nigeria and could we ship there instead. So we have the money (from a stolen card obviously). We contact our bank and they suggested a refund which contradicted advice from our payment processor. As this is only one customer from thousands we have held onto the money and are currently waiting a chargeback letter which may or may not come. We reported this to the police here and have a crime number (not that they will do anything about it)
A few days later we had 2 new transactions go through (we even found the original fraudster had emailed another Nigerian at an IT firm and that he contacted us from a Yahoo mailbox). Again we have the money and didn't even bother to try and ship to bogus UK address.
Since this we have implemented several new strategies that will stop any further transactions from either going as we use our own bespoke shopping cart and can make the required mods, for example any transaction over a certain value will go in and be pending until we manually authorise whilst we check email address and possibly phone customer.
The mods will avoid chargebacks in the future and negate this whole process, however I presume there must be a time that after which a bank will not be able to reclaim the funds. Is this correct?
The address given was a UK address, it is only after delivery failed and email correspondance that we found out that the person on the end of the email address was actually from Nigeria.
Are you from the UK? Because as pointed out from other posts is not the simple. Anyhows I am now talking so someone from the metropiliton fraud squad and the whole issue has moved on we will not be doing a refund just yet for 'other reasons'.
If the transaction was fraudulent, the customer will get their money back right away (well a few days), once they have faxed an affidavit of fraud.
The fact that it sometimes takes months for the chargeback to be processed back to your account, is the fault of the payment processors.
If they can't get their act together and have a standard and efficent mechanism to handle fraudulent transactions, its their fault that you get to keep the payment processors money for a few months.
A refund is a refund. A chargeback is a refund plus a fine. If you don't refund the amount you will pay the fine and your merchant will get that money. Maybe that's why they are telling you not to refund.
What type of card was it on, and what was the reason code?
