What Is Chargeback Management Software?
Chargeback management software helps companies that accept credit and debit card payments reduce the risk of transaction fraud that can lead to chargebacks, whether those chargebacks are fraudulent or not. This is done by monitoring, logging, and flagging transaction data. Certain software may also offer chargeback dispute resolution tools.
In other words, chargeback management software helps you manage chargeback risk by either reducing it proactively – via defenses such as ensuring only legitimate payments go through – or by efficiently challenging chargeback requests.
It doesn’t matter whether the chargeback in question is a result of fraud or not. Merchants always bear the brunt of chargebacks, so seek to avoid the additional charges associated with them. After all, even a refund is less costly.
Key Features of Chargeback Management Tools and Solutions
Chargeback management software works by letting your company do some or all of the following:
- Monitor chargeback rates: Your chargeback rate should ideally never go above 1% of all processed transactions. If it does, you may be classified as high risk, meaning you could be charged a higher card transaction fee or even get blacklisted by card networks.
- Prevent chargebacks: By monitoring payment and user data, you should be able to flag and stop suspicious transactions. This is usually done by feeding the data through risk rules, which output a risk score. You can then accept, refuse, or review the payment.
- Investigate payments: All the payment and user data should be kept in detailed logs, which you can investigate to understand how chargebacks happen at your company.
- Resolve chargeback disputes: If you enter the chargeback dispute process, your chargeback management software should provide you with all the evidence you need in the form of spreadsheets, dispute templates, dispute codes, and so on.
- Review chargeback rules: Finally, a key part of managing chargebacks is the ability to label information from past chargeback cases. This can help train your system to avoid false positives and false negatives, thus improving results. When machine learning is available, as it is with SEON, you will also get new rule suggestions specific to your needs.
The 9 Best Chargeback Management Solutions
The ten vendors we present below implement different approaches to chargeback management. Remember that there is no one-size-fits-all. Make sure you keep your specific needs in mind when choosing the right tool for your company.
SEON
SEON is the leading fraud prevention and anti-money laundering solution, transforming how top-tier risk teams fight fraud. Founded initially to solve fraud problems in the crypto space, the company has evolved to protect over 5,000 global companies, including Afterpay, Revolut, Wise, Bilt and Branch. SEON is one of the best solutions for preventing chargebacks before they happen. This is all done by giving you the most complete transaction and user behavior monitoring options available.
Here is a summary of what SEON offers:
- Data enrichment modules: You can learn a lot about whether your users are legitimate buyers or not by looking at red flags raised by a fake email address, phone number, or a lack of social media presence (for instance).
- Flag suspicious payments: Gain all the data intelligence you need without asking for extra verification. You can request 3DS PSD2 exemption and process more payments without adding friction to the buyer’s journey.
- Better control over transactions: SEON’s powerful risk scoring lets you set thresholds manually and use custom rules to instantly approve, deny, or manually review transactions.
- Bank Identification Number (BIN) check: Learn when you’re dealing with valid cards, prepaid cards, or gift cards with our BIN checks. Only accept the cards you deem safe enough, to avoid processing fraudulent purchases.
- Automated chargeback management powered by Chargeflow: If chargebacks do occur, SEON handles the heavy lifting handling the dispute from to start to resolution.
SEON is more than just a software solution – it is your business partner in chargeback management, with insightful digital footprint analysis and machine learning.
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Sift
Sift is another complete fraud prevention solution that happens to offer a chargeback module. The module comes from the acquisition of Chargeback.com, the pioneer in real-time dispute resolution for merchants, so you get both prevention and resolution in one package.
Here is a summary of what Sift offers:
- Evidence management: Collects and organizes the necessary data to dispute chargebacks effectively, such as transaction details, user activity logs, and communication history.
- Integrated workflows: Seamlessly connects with payment processors and chargeback platforms to ensure timely responses.
- Chargeback categorization: Insights into why chargebacks are occurring, such as fraud, customer dissatisfaction, or operational errors.
- Fraud and revenue impact analysis: Balances fraud prevention with revenue optimization by identifying false positives or missed opportunities.
Chargebacks911
When it comes to being prepared for a post-chargeback dispute, the company offers many of the tools you need to collect evidence, submit it in the context of a dispute, and sift through the data for your own reporting. You’ll also get a single source for all your resolution templates, chargeback codes, and the kind of evidence you need to submit.
Here is a summary of what Chargebacks911 offers:
- Chargeback prevention: Offers tools such as order vlauation, merchant compliance reviews, and Intelligent Source Detection to identify the root cause of chargebacks.
- Chargeback dispute management: handles the entire process of responding to chargebacks, including evidence submission and tracking outcomes
- Affiliate fraud monitoring: Identifies and blocks fraud from affiliate marketing campaigns that generate chargebacks
Verifi
Verifi accelerates the average resolution time to an average of 24 hours. The tool is utlized mainly for resolution rather than prevention, but approach can bring peace of mind to retailers who face a bottleneck in that department – especially when you know that Visa is involved. One of the key offerings of Verifi is its trademarked Cardholder Dispute Resolution Network. It acts as an intermediary between merchants and issuers, allowing you to close the loop during the chargeback process, resolving the issue directly with the consumer.
Here is a summary of what Verifi offers:
- Order Insight: provides detailed transaction information to issuing banks and cardholders in real-time.
- Collaboration network: Connects merchants, issuers, and acquires to facilitate real-time communication and early resolution of disputes before they become chargebacks
- Rapid dispute resolution: Automatically resolves disputes based on predefined rules set by the merchant. This helps resolve claims at the pre-dispute stage without merchant intervention.
- Issuer despite management: Enables issuers to resolve disputes directly with merchants, reducing the risk of chargebacks.
- Dispute data analysis: Identifies patterns in disputes and chargebacks to optimize prevention strategies
ChargebackGurus
Managed Chargeback Prevention and Resolution
ChargebackGurus focuses on thwarting chargebacks to beginning with prevention which is mostly covered by chargeback alerts based on your own risk rules. Their recovery stage is managed by experts who monitor and review orders in real-time. You will need to give the company access to your settlements, fees, and reserves, but it may be more than worth it for high-risk companies that need to reduce chargeback rates at any cost.
Here is a summary of what Chargeback Gurus offers:
- Root cause analysis: Identifies the underlying causes of chargebacks, such as fraud, operational errors, or customers dissatisfaction, and recommends tailored solutions
- End-to-end chargeback handling: Prepares and submits responses with the required evidence to dispute chargebacks effectively
- Ethoca and Verifi Partnerships: Provides merchants with instant alerts for potential disputes, enabling them to resolve issues with customers before they escalate into chargebacks.
MiDiGATOR
MiDiGATOR was founded in 2013 by a collective of ecommerce merchants who were having difficulty navigating chargebacks in their own companies. They decided to collaborate to fill the gap in the market for a real-time solution. In Q2 2022, Equifax announced its acquisition of MiDiGATOR to fill out its own fraud prevention platforms. MiDiGATOR is a tool designed to fully cover the process of the inevitable chargebacks that every ecommerce company faces
Here is a summary of what MiDiGATOR offers:
- Dispute response automation: Generates and submits comprehensive chargeback responses with all necessary evidence, tailored to the requirements of payment processors and card networks.
- Rules-based dispute handling: Customizes responses based on predefined rules for specific chargeback types, increasing the likelihood of successful outcomes.
- Data sharing: Collaborates with payment processors and issuers to resolve disputes caused by customer misunderstandings.
- Chargeback ratio monitoring: Tracks chargeback rates to ensure compliance with thresholds set by Visa, Mastercard, and other networks.
- Plug-and-rlay setup: Provides easy integration options for faster onboarding and implementation
ChargebackOps
Rather than a dedicated software suite, ChargebackOps is more akin to a consultancy, offering on-site chargeback solutions to major ecommerce entities. Customers are assigned dedicated specialists who handle the company’s disputes with a proprietary application, functioning as an extension of an existing fraud team.
Here is a summary of what ChargebackOps offers:
- Chargeback Response Preparation: Prepares and submits detailed responses to disputes, adhering to the specific requirements of payment processors and card networks.
- Comprehensive Dispute Handling: Manages the entire chargeback lifecycle, from receiving notifications to tracking outcomes.
- Dedicated Chargeback Specialists: Offers one-on-one support to help businesses navigate complex disputes.
- Compliance Reviews: Ensures dispute responses and business practices adhere to network rules and guidelines.
Quavo
Quavo’s chargeback management product, QFD Automated Dispute Management Software, is a cloud-based solution focusing on automation and compliance during the dispute process. With compliance being a large part of what QFD offers, the product is aimed primarily at online banks and other financial products.
Here is a summary of what Quavo offers:
- End-to-End workflow automation: Manages the entire chargeback lifecycle, from intake and processing to resolution and reporting.
- Fraud detection integration: Integrates with fraud detection systems to identify and block high-risk transactions before they result in disputes.
- Proactive communication: Improves transaction transparency with cardholders to reduce disputes caused by misunderstandings.
- Automated evidence gathering: Collects and organizes transaction data, cardholder interactions, and other evidence required to resolve disputes efficiently.
- Predictive analytics: Uses AI to forecast chargeback trends and recommend prevention strategies.
Kount
Kount also offers a number of ways to improve your bottom line. Its Command tool, for instance, provides end-to-end protection for all CNP transactions.
Its chargeback management solution is an all-in-one platform designed to let you monitor transaction data, flag suspicious payments, and even send the appropriate data as part of your case management.
Here is a summary of what Kount offers:
- Evidence compilation: Aggregates transaction and customer data to provide evidence for disputes.
- Data integration: Facilitates collaboration between merchants and payment processors to address disputes effectively.
- Loyal customer identification: Protects legitimate customers from unnecessary transaction declines, improving customer satisfaction.
- Identity Trust Global Network™: Leverages data from billions of transactions across industries to identify legitimate customers and differentiate them from fraudsters.
See our tool in action in how we monitor, log, and flag transaction data using advanced APIs, machine learning and unique social signals.
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Different Types of Chargeback Management Solutions
A key point to consider before diving into the right features is how exactly to manage your chargeback management solution. Here are a few options.
Software (On-Site or SaaS)
A growing number of companies choose to outsource their chargeback management platform to a third-party software company and then manage it themselves. The tool may be cloud-based or installed on-premise, but the idea is that the development and features of the software are outsourced, and you provide the manpower to run it.
Pros | Cons |
Flexibility and adjustability | You must employ chargeback and payments experts |
Better control over the whole system | Automation still needs to be supervised |
Affordable |
Fully Managed
Some chargeback management companies go the extra mile by selling you both the tools and the expertise. With this option, you are essentially outsourcing an entire chargeback management team.
Pros | Cons |
Leverage experience from professionals | Significantly more expensive than SaaS |
Requires less staff time | Less control over how chargebacks are solved or prevented |
Hybrid Solutions
Finally, some companies decide that neither SaaS nor fully managed fits their business model, so opt for a combination of the two. There is always the option to purchase the chargeback management tools you can understand and outsource specific tasks, such as dispute resolution, to another service.
Pros | Cons |
Maximum control and flexibility | Need to carefully plan integration and coordination across systems |
The more services you purchase, the more expensive it will be |
How to Choose Chargeback Management Software
As with any other kind of third-party software, there are key points to consider when it comes to chargeback management and related solutions to stop chargeback fraud:
- Features: Double-check that the software can do everything you need it to. Some solutions are better suited to fraud management, while others are better for managing disputes (for instance).
- Integration: How you deploy the software could play a huge role in your decision, as we explored in the different types of integrations available above.
- Onboarding Support: Does the vendor offer extra help to get started? Is this support free or paid?
- Ongoing Support: Does the vendor manage disputes for you if they occur? Or are you responsible for collecting evidence for the case?
- Pricing: There tend to be two schools of thought here. Some vendors offer a flat monthly fee with a chargeback guarantee. Others charge a small percentage of every checked transaction. There are benefits to each model, but there is also a potential conflict of interest in chargeback guarantees.
Chargeback management software is designed to protect your business from fraud, enable you to process more payments with peace of mind, and ensure you are protected in case of a dispute.
However, no two companies offer exactly the same features. We hope this post clears things up when you’re looking for a way to reduce chargeback rates, understand what causes them, and discover how to stop them from happening in the first place.
FAQs
Chargeback management software lets you aggregate all the transaction and user data you may need to automatically flag suspicious transactions and/or present evidence during the chargeback dispute process.
Chargeback management software should give you access to as much transaction and customer information as possible. The information should give you the confidence to make an informed decision about blocking or accepting a payment.
It is unsustainable for a merchant to attempt to manage chargebacks manually. It just takes too much time – one very good reason to use software to manage chargebacks. However, the most important reason is tied to how thorough one has to be both when preventing chargebacks and when challenging chargeback recovery attempts. Without meticulous processes as well as records of them, you cannot prove your product and/or service was up to par.