Credit Card Fraud Prevention for Businesses
FRAUD PREVENTION FOR BUSINESSES
Most payment fraud is preventable. Software alone will not do it.
We find the gaps fraudsters actually use, tighten the procedures around how your business accepts payments, and cut the losses and chargebacks that follow. No new software licence required.
Fraud is a process problem before it is a technology problem. We review how money comes into your business, train the people handling it, and put practical controls in place that stop losses without turning away good customers.
THE PROBLEM
Fraud software is not the same as fraud prevention
Payment fraud keeps rising, and most businesses respond by shopping for a tool. Fraud scoring, device fingerprinting and rules engines all have their place, but technology alone is rarely enough. Many of these platforms are expensive, and in plenty of cases they cost more each year than the fraud they actually stop.
The reason is simple. A scoring engine can flag an unusual transaction, but it cannot stop an employee from processing a refund to a card that never paid you, and it cannot stop your accounts team from wiring money because an email looked like it came from a supplier. Those losses come through procedure gaps, not through the checkout.
The most effective defence combines three things that cost far less than a licence: clear payment procedures, staff who know the warning signs, and controls placed where money actually moves. That is what we build with you.
THE THREATS
Where B2B payment fraud actually comes from
01
Card not present fraud
Orders placed by phone, email or web using card details the buyer does not own. The goods ship, the real cardholder disputes, and you carry the loss plus a chargeback fee.
02
Account takeover
A legitimate customer account is compromised and used to place orders or change delivery details. The transaction looks clean because the account history is real.
03
Stolen card testing
Small repeated authorisations run against your payment page to find which stolen cards still work. Even the declines cost you, because most processors bill per authorisation attempt.
04
Refund and friendly fraud
Refunds pushed to a different card, duplicate credits, or a genuine customer disputing a charge they recognise. Weak refund authority inside your own business is the common thread.
05
Business email compromise
A convincing email asking you to update a supplier bank account or pay an urgent invoice. No card is involved, which is exactly why fraud tools never see it.
06
Internal and employee theft
Unauthorised refunds, voided sales, or card data handled where it should not be. This is a permissions and separation of duties problem, and it is usually invisible until someone reconciles.
WARNING SIGNS
The signals your team should be trained to catch
Fraud methods change constantly, but the tells in front of your staff have stayed remarkably consistent. These are the ones worth stopping on:
An unusually large first order from a brand new account, especially one that does not haggle on price.
Several declined cards in a row, then one that finally goes through.
Billing and shipping addresses that do not match, or freight forwarder delivery addresses.
Pressure to rush. Same day shipping, a deadline, a reason the usual checks cannot happen.
A request to change bank details or payment instructions on an existing supplier or customer.
A buyer who resists standard verification, or who cannot answer basic questions about their own company.
Refund requests routed to a card or account other than the one that paid.
If you want the longer walkthrough of how these attacks are run and what to do in the moment, we cover it in detail in how to stop credit card fraud.
OUR APPROACH
What a weAudit fraud review covers
01
Identify fraud warning signs
We help your team recognise suspicious payment activity, unusual customer behaviour, card testing attempts and the other common signs of fraud, before they turn into losses you cannot recover.
02
Strengthen payment procedures
We review how your business accepts payments across every channel and recommend practical controls that reduce fraud without making it harder for legitimate customers to buy from you.
03
Reduce fraud and chargebacks
Better verification, documentation and staff training cut preventable fraud and materially improve your position when you do have to fight a chargeback.
THE CONTROLS
The controls that do the most work
None of these require a new platform. Most are policy decisions and settings you already have access to.
Address and security code verification switched on, and set to actually decline rather than just record a mismatch.
A refund policy that names who can authorise one, above what amount, and to which card.
Velocity limits on your payment page so card testing runs out of room quickly.
Callback verification on any bank detail change, using a number you already held, never one in the email.
Separation of duties, so the person who takes the payment is not the person who approves the credit.
Documented order records that give you evidence worth submitting when you dispute a chargeback.
Card data kept out of email, spreadsheets and notebooks, which is also a PCI compliance requirement.
WHO THIS IS FOR
Who gets the most out of this
Fraud prevention work pays back fastest where the order value is high, the sales process involves a human, and payments arrive through more than one channel. That usually means distributors, wholesalers, manufacturers, professional services firms and any business taking card details over the phone or by email.
It also tends to matter more than owners expect at businesses with several locations or several people authorised to issue refunds. The more hands touch a payment, the more places a control can be missing.
If you are mainly card present retail with low ticket sizes, your exposure is different and usually smaller. We will tell you that on the call rather than sell you a review you do not need.
HOW IT FITS
How fraud prevention fits with the rest of your payment setup
Fraud rarely sits on its own. Chargebacks show up as fees on your merchant statement, weak card handling shows up as a compliance problem, and the way your contract is written decides how much each incident actually costs you.
A credit card processing audit reads your statement line by line and shows what chargebacks, authorisations and penalty fees are really costing. PCI compliance covers how card data is stored and handled. Restructuring your contract deals with the terms that decide your exposure when something does go wrong.
If you would rather start by understanding your own bill, the statement decoder explains what each line item means. We also run fraud training for teams that want the staff side handled directly.
COMMON QUESTIONS
Common questions
Do we need to buy fraud prevention software?
Usually not. Most of the exposure we find is closed with settings you already own and procedures you already half have. If a tool genuinely earns its cost in your situation we will say so, and we do not sell one.Will tighter controls cost us sales?
That is the trade off worth managing carefully, and it is why we do not simply turn every filter to maximum. The aim is controls that catch the patterns fraud uses while leaving a normal customer order untouched.We already had fraud losses. Can you get that money back?
Recovering a completed fraud loss is rare and depends on the card networks and your processor. What we can usually do is improve your evidence and dispute process so the next one is fought properly, and close the gap that let it happen.How long does a review take?
It depends on how many payment channels and locations you run. We scope it on the first call so you know what is involved before anything starts.Is this the same as PCI compliance?
No. PCI is about how card data is stored and handled, and it is a requirement placed on you by the card networks. Fraud prevention is about stopping losses. They overlap, and we handle PCI compliance separately.Find out where you are exposed
A short call is enough to work out whether you have a fraud problem, a procedure problem, or a fee problem dressed up as one. Bring a recent merchant statement if you have it to hand.
Want to talk?
- Call us today 800-672-1292
- Book a free consultation
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