Why the Heck Did You Dispute that Credit Card Charge?

Customers can dispute a credit card charge for any number of reasons. Sometimes the bank or your credit card merchant can you tell how or why the customer disputed the charge, but often times the information or the reason codes provided are as beneficial as bringing a knife to a gun fight. So now you might be wondering... What did I do next?

Sometimes the best and only way to get down to business is to call and speak with the person directly responsible for placing the order. In my experience you'd be amazed by the reasons why a customer might dispute a credit card charge. Sometimes it's something innocent, like maybe the person in their billing department wasn't aware of the order or was not familiar with your company name as it appeared on their credit card statement, so they disputed the charge under the assumption that it was fraudulent. This happens more than you think. These disputes are often the easiest to solve, as all it takes is a phone call from the customer to their bank to explain the mix-up and the matter will often be instantly closed in the distributor's favor.

Any way you slice it, $500.00 is a lot of green, and I had to get to the bottom of this. So I gave my client a phone call, devoting my full attention while providing the customer a chance to tell their side of the story. I made sure to do more listening than talking, I was patient, and despite my frustration, I didn't lose my cool. As it turned out, of the 350 mugs that my customer ordered, half of them arrived broken. For whatever reason, instead of contacting me to reach a solution, she simply disputed the credit card charge.