Chargebacks911® COO Weighs-In on Facebook’s Chargeback Controversy
In her monthly guest feature for Forbes, Monica Eaton touches on the recent controversy rising from Facebook’s attitude toward chargebacks in games designed for their platform.
Many outlets covered this story in recent weeks. For years, Facebook reportedly instructed developers to avoid adding in fail-safes to prevent underage users from making purchases with a parent’s payment information.
But, as Monica points out, the situation is much more complicated than most seem to realize. Facebook isn’t simply taking advantage of users, as some suggest, nor are they solely to blame. Instead, the situation speaks to a need within the payments industry to grapple with how we understand each party’s responsibilities.
“The thought process follows that, even if some purchases are overturned by chargebacks, the result is still more profitable than introducing additional friction to a transaction,” Monica explains. “If that’s the calculus some businesses turn to, though, we clearly have a problem.”
Instead of seeing this as just another blow to Facebook’s credibility, we should all take it as an opportunity. Now that the issue of friendly fraud is in the mainstream, we have a chance to discuss responsible practices for merchants, banks and cardholders alike.
