🏦 Fintech, Financial Services, and Insurance

This industry includes businesses that offer financial services such as digital banking, loan disbursements, investment platforms, savings apps, wallets, insurance, and other related services. These businesses mostly operate digitally with minimal physical interaction.

• Value not received: A dispute may arise if a customer completes a payment but does not see the expected value reflected in their account. This could occur in several ways:

  • A loan repayment is done, but the customer’s account still shows an outstanding balance.

  • A customer tops up their savings, investment, or insurance account, but the balance remains unchanged.

  • A wallet funding transaction is completed successfully, but the wallet is not credited.

• Cancelled subscription: A customer may cancel an automated savings, insurance, or investment plan, but still get charged. Similarly, customers who have fully repaid their loans may be surprised by further debits, resulting in a dispute.

• Duplicate payments: Customers may be charged twice for the same service due to errors encountered or confusion during checkout. If both transactions appear as successful and the customer gets debited, a dispute may be initiated for one.

• Failed transaction: On occasion, customers are debited during a failed transaction. E.g., the customer does not get a prompt that their payment was successful, and in seeking a refund, they raise a dispute with their bank.

• Unrecognized transactions: Some customers may not recognize charges due to unclear merchant descriptors. Others may see a debit appear days after completing a transaction, which adds to the confusion.

• Unauthorized transactions: If a cardholder gets a charge on their account that they didn’t initiate, they may report it as fraud. This could be due to compromised card details, shared device use, or internal fraud. These disputes are typically raised as fraud chargebacks or fraud claims.

• A receipt showing successful service delivery. This receipt should have these details:

  • Customer’s information (name, email address, phone number, home address, etc)

  • Transaction details: Transaction amount, the payment reference on Paystack, and the transaction date.

  • Description of the service delivery:

    • For loan repayments: Include loan amount, disbursement date, repayment dates, the amount charged, and outstanding repayments (if any).

    • For savings, investment, wallet, or insurance top-ups: Clearly show that the customer’s account was credited and the purpose of the payment.

Pre-arbitration chargebacks occur when a customer or their bank is dissatisfied with the original dispute response. At this stage, more compelling and detailed evidence is needed. Here's how to handle them:

• Re-evaluate the dispute: Double-check if the customer truly received value. If not, accept the pre-arbitration promptly.

  However, if they received value, you need to provide detailed supporting documents to prove that value was indeed delivered.

• As a savings, investment, or any other financial services merchant, you can provide a statement of the customer’s account. The statement should show when the disputed transaction was applied to the account, along with up to 3 transactions that occurred before and after it.

• As a lending merchant, you can provide the details of the loan amount transferred to the customer. If the loan was sent to the customer via a transfer from your Paystack dashboard, a screenshot of the transfer should be provided that clearly shows the date it was transferred and the receiving account. If the loan was transferred to the customer outside Paystack, then the payment advice should be provided, preferably from your banking app.

  Overdue charges: If the customer’s loan repayment was overdue, you should provide details from your website that clearly show the number of days the customer was overdue and how much they were charged for defaulting.

• Communicate with the customer: If possible, engage the customer directly (preferably via email) to resolve the issue and prevent escalation. Document these conversations and include any resolution agreements reached.

• Strong KYC practices: Implement strong KYC that can be provided in the event of a dispute. Requesting customer identity documents (e.g, valid government-issued ID, a valid passport, driver’s licence, bank verification number, etc.) at signup is important. This ensures due compliance with all regulatory requirements.

• Transparency: Ensure customers can easily access and understand their payment history and account balance in-app or online. Be transparent about your policies and procedures to manage and meet customer expectations.

• Time-stamped records: Ensure that every successful transaction on the customer’s account (loan disbursement, wallet credit, investment confirmation) is logged with precise timestamps and narrations.

• Responsive customer support: Make it easy for customers to report issues early. A responsive support team can help reduce disputes and improve customer satisfaction.

• Proactive resolution: Be proactive in responding promptly to disputes and closing them out.

• Dispute training for team members: Train and educate team members on dispute resolution via the Paystack dashboard.