Although being able to accept credit cards via an online payment gateway enables businesses to increase their sales and reach new markets, it also exposes businesses to potential credit card fraud. As transactions are done online and the seller and buyer have no direct interaction it becomes more difficult for sellers to determine if their clients are genuine. In order to assist online merchants in preventing fraudulent credit card use on their websites, PayGate have developed PayProtector with risk analysis and fraud prevention services developed to meet online merchant’s specific needs.

The PayProtector services have been designed to not only block transactions that have a high probability of being fraudulent, but to assist merchants using the service in identifying high risk activity in successful transactions in order to take the appropriate action. PayProtector Online is used to screen online credit card payments via the PayGate online payment gateway and block any transactions that are found to be high risk. PayProtector Reporting is a service that will assist merchants in identifying high risk transactions processed during the previous day. This report includes transaction details such as customer location based on originating IP address, details on the bank that issued the card as well as customer email address. This report will also enable merchants to see if the payments they have received are from international credit cards. For merchants based in South Africa – if an international credit card is used to make a payment and a South African delivery address is given it may be a sign of fraudulent activity and the transaction should be investigated.

In order to reduce the possibility of fraudulent credit card use we encourage our clients using our PayWeb, PayXML Web and PayBill services both in South Africa and abroad to make use of our PayProtector suite of services. Using a combination of online fraud screening measures for online credit card processing and good business practices to identify potentially fraudulent orders received it is possible for merchants to greatly reduce the chances of fraudulent credit card use.