Firstly, we wish that you, please take care through these uncertain times and rest assured, its business as usual for Trust Payments.
As your payments partner, we want to help in every way we can and will continue to focus and support our merchant base throughout this uncertain period. We at Trust Payments are committed and well-prepared to keep your payment services running smoothly.
Based on feedback from several customers on how we can help, we have decided to give every business free access to our Touchfree payment solution.
This will enable your business to take payments from your customers via several channels, including; phone, email, Whatsapp & social media, without the need for a website.
The right solution for the right moment
- Secure and reliable – 3D secure enabled and reduced PCI DSS compliance
- No website needed, you don’t need a website to start taking payments digitally or online.
- Accept payments 24/7, and you can send payment links from any device so that you never miss a sale.
- Create and send payment links in seconds
To see how our Touch-Free Payments solution works, please click here.
2. Managing refunds
The COVID-19 pandemic is having an unprecedented effect on the hospitality industry, and we are seeing many refund transactions taking place. From speaking to our hospitality merchant base, we are asking merchants to review all reservations that they have chosen for the next few months and understand if the booking has a deposit or full payment made.
Once they have examined the number/value of payments, we then advise merchants that if they are expecting any further refunds to pre-fund the account with the expected value. This will cover the potential refunds so that you then have a reserve held against your account.
Negative balance
In normal processing circumstances, refunds are offset against the daily settlement totals that are paid into your business bank account and therefore your account remains in a positive balance. Regrettably, the number of refunds that hotels appear to be processing is higher than the total payments processed, and therefore have left the merchant account in a negative balance.
3. Chargebacks
Did you know, the life cycle of a chargeback is 6 months from the date of goods/service purchased.
Types of chargebacks
Fraud Transactions – When a payment has been debited without the authorisation or consent of the cardholder. In cases like these, the merchant is held responsible – to migrate the financial responsibility a merchant can use 3D Secure authentication on the cardholder. In this case, financial responsibility is shifted to the issuer. Merchants do however have the duty to prevent fraudulent transactions.
Item is not received – When the customer did not receive the item for which they paid for.
Credit not processed – When the customer has been promised a refund and no refunds have been received by the cardholder.
Cancellation of Orders – Customer cancels an order, but the goods are still shipped.
Technical Problem – When a technical problem between the issuing bank and the merchant may lead to the cardholder being charged twice for the same transaction.
Reporting chargebacks
Trust Payments provide two methods for keeping track of chargebacks processed on your account:
- Automated URL Notifications sent to a server of your choosing.
- Our MyST portal can be used to browse records of chargebacks.
Disputing chargebacks
It may be possible for you to dispute a chargeback if you have reasonable cause for doubting the customer’s case (e.g. a customer claims a package was not delivered but the package was signed for).
For any queries relating to chargebacks processed on your acquiring.com account, please contact our chargebacks team who will support you in disputing the chargeback.
4. What other hotels are doing
- Refunding your customers in advance via a pre-funded account
- Look at utilising the account check system to validate a customer card and store as a token
- Updating your payments terms T&C’s to reflect how payments can be refunded/cancelled
- Provide options for customers to move their reservation to a future date
- Provide gift vouchers to customers with existing bookings
- We recommend you contact your acquiring bank prior to issuing any large refunds for cancelled events
To find out more about how we can help your business to grow and achieve greater success, please get in touch with our team of experts today.
