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From your description, this is solidly Amex’s problem, and all of your contact should be with Amex (or with the merchant you can’t reach). I have no idea why th

From your description, this is solidly Amex’s problem, and all of your contact should be with Amex (or with the merchant you can’t reach). I have no idea why they would tell you to contact a merchants credit card processor. In fact it’s such a bizarre instruction from Amex, it makes me wonder how you described this to Amex.

dubcanada 4y ago
I am curious about your response, what do you think I should do differently? And why do you think this is AMEX's problem? Also how should I describe a rather basic problem? I told them every aspect of it multiple times to multiple tiers of customer service. Email chains (or lack thereof), website details (include login), they already have transaction details. I am not saying it's a 100% Stripes problem, I am wondering why I am able to chargeback it 7 times in a row, and that does not trigger any red flags. If a single customer chargebacks a "subscription" multiple times in a row, should that not be an immediate cancel? Why can I not go to Stripe, fill out my credit card, and click cancel and cancel a subscription? They already have a portal to get transaction information, why not allow me to cancel. Since it's all webhooks anyways, what difference is it if it is through X merchant site or Stripe?
- rgbrenner 4y ago
  It's Amex's problem contractually. The contractual relationships here are: customer -> card issuer (amex) -> card network (amex) <- card processor (stripe) <- merchant -> customer So as you can see, you have no relationship with Stripe. Your have a relationship with Amex and the merchant. Those are your points of contact. When you make a chargeback, Amex accepts this chargeback, and sends it to the merchant's processor, who then presents it to the merchant for response. This is a process defined in the contracts between each of the parties. To your other question regarding fraud controls in this system, that's handled in the contracts: - If you skip out on your debt, Amex must still pay for any charges they authorized. (The payment flow is customer -> Amex -> stripe -> merchant. This flow is reversed for a chargeback/refund.) - If a merchant skips out, stripe is still responsible for any chargebacks. Think about what this means: If stripe accepts too many high-risk merchants, they'll lose money. If Amex accepts too many high risk customers, they'll lose money. So they each have an interest in controlling fraud. So what happens when a merchant gets too many chargebacks (typically less than 1%): Stripe will refuse to do business with that merchant. Why would they do this? Because if Stripe has too many chargebacks, the card network will refuse to do business with Stripe. They may be able to recertify as a high risk processor, but that comes with additional requirements... and if its above those high-risk levels, the card network won't allow stripe to process any payments at all. This is all defined contractually. What is the contract you have? You have a contract with Amex: your credit card terms. And you have either an implied or explicit contract with the merchant that they must meet. Stripe and Amex are not fully aware of your contract with the merchant (refer to first relationship graph above). Part of the chargeback process is the merchant's response. A valid chargeback defense is that the charge meets the contractual terms the customer agreed to (assuming nothing illegal is going on). When the merchant presents the contract in their response, Stripe and Amex can review that contract. Amex (as the card issuer) gets to decide if they accept or reject the merchant's response and issue a decision on the chargeback. (Stripe (on behalf of the merchant) can disagree with this, and it then goes to the card network for a decision.) So that's the whole process. If you go to stripe directly (as a customer), you're attempting to do an end run around this contractually enforced process... and stripe isnt going to do that (unless they want to be sued for tortious interference by the merchant). So hopefully you can see why Amex telling you to call Stripe is so bizarre. What makes it even more odd is that the type of dispute you have is something Amex handles like a 1000 times a day... they have a process for it. And FYI: Amex can block a merchant from charging you in the future. (Easy on their part: just stop authorizing the charge from the merchant.)
  - dubcanada 4y ago
    I'm spoke to 12 regular customer service agents (over the months), and 2 managers at this point. How much further up the chain do I need to go? All of them said the exact same thing, "There is nothing more they can do, I need to contact the merchant (I cannot) or Stripe.". I've got it blocked every single time (I guess blocked is an attempt and does not guarantee it will be blocked) I called, and every dispute online via the checkbox. While I believe everything you said, I have not experienced it.
    - leesalminen 4y ago
      Do you mention Stripe by name, or the concept of a payment processor at all? Sometimes when I’m on with CS, if I let it slip that I know a little something about what’s wrong they take the easy out and send me on my way by regurgitating what I just said as the solution. The average person doesn’t know anything about Stripe or payment processing. I find it hard to think Amex would steer you that way out of the blue. Is Amex really saying “here’s a phone number to some third party, resolve it yourself”? Totally unprompted? I would call in and pretend to be as dumb as possible. All you know is you keep getting charged and you don’t want the charges anymore. The business phone number you have is disconnected. Let them take it from there.
    - likeabbas 4y ago
      I’ll try to add some food for thought: customer service agents and their managers do not know everything. In fact, most of the times, they do not actually know how the products work. They just know what they’re told and they’re only told what they ask. But if they don’t know what to ask, then they can get caught in a situation where they just default to blaming you or someone else so they can close the ticket. Your best bet is to get in contact with someone who is in sales who can escalate this to an engineer or other more technical person. One way to do this may be to declare that you will tell your customers AMEX is no longer acceptable unless they help you resolve the issue. This may seem harsh but I bet it would work at AMEX and not a VISA or Mastercard
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benj111 4y ago
Being 2 years into a complaint with amex, 'bizarre instructions' don't surprise me at all.
herbst 4y ago
I have a debit credit card. The only option I have to cancel fraudulent payments is closing the card and getting a new one for $40 and changing all my payment informations everywhere. No idea why this is, and no idea why anyone would give out his data to unknown companies under this conditions.

dubcanada 4y ago

I am curious about your response, what do you think I should do differently? And why do you think this is AMEX's problem? Also how should I describe a rather basic problem? I told them every aspect of it multiple times to multiple tiers of customer service. Email chains (or lack thereof), website details (include login), they already have transaction details. I am not saying it's a 100% Stripes problem, I am wondering why I am able to chargeback it 7 times in a row, and that does not trigger any red flags. If a single customer chargebacks a "subscription" multiple times in a row, should that not be an immediate cancel? Why can I not go to Stripe, fill out my credit card, and click cancel and cancel a subscription? They already have a portal to get transaction information, why not allow me to cancel. Since it's all webhooks anyways, what difference is it if it is through X merchant site or Stripe?

rgbrenner 4y ago
It's Amex's problem contractually. The contractual relationships here are: customer -> card issuer (amex) -> card network (amex) <- card processor (stripe) <- merchant -> customer So as you can see, you have no relationship with Stripe. Your have a relationship with Amex and the merchant. Those are your points of contact. When you make a chargeback, Amex accepts this chargeback, and sends it to the merchant's processor, who then presents it to the merchant for response. This is a process defined in the contracts between each of the parties. To your other question regarding fraud controls in this system, that's handled in the contracts: - If you skip out on your debt, Amex must still pay for any charges they authorized. (The payment flow is customer -> Amex -> stripe -> merchant. This flow is reversed for a chargeback/refund.) - If a merchant skips out, stripe is still responsible for any chargebacks. Think about what this means: If stripe accepts too many high-risk merchants, they'll lose money. If Amex accepts too many high risk customers, they'll lose money. So they each have an interest in controlling fraud. So what happens when a merchant gets too many chargebacks (typically less than 1%): Stripe will refuse to do business with that merchant. Why would they do this? Because if Stripe has too many chargebacks, the card network will refuse to do business with Stripe. They may be able to recertify as a high risk processor, but that comes with additional requirements... and if its above those high-risk levels, the card network won't allow stripe to process any payments at all. This is all defined contractually. What is the contract you have? You have a contract with Amex: your credit card terms. And you have either an implied or explicit contract with the merchant that they must meet. Stripe and Amex are not fully aware of your contract with the merchant (refer to first relationship graph above). Part of the chargeback process is the merchant's response. A valid chargeback defense is that the charge meets the contractual terms the customer agreed to (assuming nothing illegal is going on). When the merchant presents the contract in their response, Stripe and Amex can review that contract. Amex (as the card issuer) gets to decide if they accept or reject the merchant's response and issue a decision on the chargeback. (Stripe (on behalf of the merchant) can disagree with this, and it then goes to the card network for a decision.) So that's the whole process. If you go to stripe directly (as a customer), you're attempting to do an end run around this contractually enforced process... and stripe isnt going to do that (unless they want to be sued for tortious interference by the merchant). So hopefully you can see why Amex telling you to call Stripe is so bizarre. What makes it even more odd is that the type of dispute you have is something Amex handles like a 1000 times a day... they have a process for it. And FYI: Amex can block a merchant from charging you in the future. (Easy on their part: just stop authorizing the charge from the merchant.)
- dubcanada 4y ago
  I'm spoke to 12 regular customer service agents (over the months), and 2 managers at this point. How much further up the chain do I need to go? All of them said the exact same thing, "There is nothing more they can do, I need to contact the merchant (I cannot) or Stripe.". I've got it blocked every single time (I guess blocked is an attempt and does not guarantee it will be blocked) I called, and every dispute online via the checkbox. While I believe everything you said, I have not experienced it.
  - leesalminen 4y ago
    Do you mention Stripe by name, or the concept of a payment processor at all? Sometimes when I’m on with CS, if I let it slip that I know a little something about what’s wrong they take the easy out and send me on my way by regurgitating what I just said as the solution. The average person doesn’t know anything about Stripe or payment processing. I find it hard to think Amex would steer you that way out of the blue. Is Amex really saying “here’s a phone number to some third party, resolve it yourself”? Totally unprompted? I would call in and pretend to be as dumb as possible. All you know is you keep getting charged and you don’t want the charges anymore. The business phone number you have is disconnected. Let them take it from there.
  - likeabbas 4y ago
    I’ll try to add some food for thought: customer service agents and their managers do not know everything. In fact, most of the times, they do not actually know how the products work. They just know what they’re told and they’re only told what they ask. But if they don’t know what to ask, then they can get caught in a situation where they just default to blaming you or someone else so they can close the ticket. Your best bet is to get in contact with someone who is in sales who can escalate this to an engineer or other more technical person. One way to do this may be to declare that you will tell your customers AMEX is no longer acceptable unless they help you resolve the issue. This may seem harsh but I bet it would work at AMEX and not a VISA or Mastercard
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benj111 4y ago

Being 2 years into a complaint with amex, 'bizarre instructions' don't surprise me at all.

herbst 4y ago

I have a debit credit card. The only option I have to cancel fraudulent payments is closing the card and getting a new one for $40 and changing all my payment informations everywhere. No idea why this is, and no idea why anyone would give out his data to unknown companies under this conditions.