Subject: Declines Research
From: "Lynch, David" <[email-masked]>
To: "Mike" <[email-masked]>
Cc: "Davis, Jason" <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 10 Dec 2007 08:42:34 -0700

Michael,

I had a chance to work with our Product, Technical and Engineering teams
regarding the issues you are experiencing and here is the result of this
investigation.  

Technical Issues- There are no technical Issues, we were able to
ascertain that the transactions were being passed from your system to
the Gateway and the cardholder banks without interruption.  

Engineering- the API calls that is placed from the Gateway to the Credit
Card Banks is functioning, and the results of the approvals and declines
are in the Log Files that were traced and reviewed by engineering.  This
means we are making a call with the data you provide us, and the Credit
Card Banks are responding with Approvals and Declines.

Product-All Payflow Product Models are functioning properly.

Logic and Process Analysis-  When Legal Posters presents Payflow with
the data to make the API call to the Credit Card Bank they are supplying
the minimum amount of data possible- CC# and Exp. Date.  This meets
minimum requirements but is not ideal in that the Credit Card Banks
utilize the input data to make determinations for approvals by first
screening the transactions through front end Risk/Fraud Prevention
Models.  A merchant will always experience a higher level of declines
when certain data is not passed such as Name, CVV2, Addresses etc. CVV2
is the Security Key that the CC Banks provides that will identify if a
card is actually present, and its input can greatly assist in reducing
declines.  

When a Cardholder calls their bank and asks the Customer Service Dept.
what is wrong with their account, or why they cannot purchase an item
this information may not be available to the Level 1 Customer Service
agent if the transaction was screened on the front end of the
transaction by modeling.  This would also account for the cardholder
using their card to make other purchases such as presenting their card
in person or buying from another website (which may send more data to
the processor such as CVV2) and having success.  

The recommendation to assist in increasing the amount of successful
transactions would be to ensure your integration on the payflow system
is providing the Processor and Credit Card Banks with the most robust
data set to assist them in making their determination.  I am not sure if
there were cost or system related reasons for what your input is
currently, but adding Address and CVV2 will only create a more robust
data set for the CC Bank to utilize in the sub-second financial
decision.  

Who did your original integration, and made the Data Output decisions?
This may be a good place to start. 

David Lynch

Enterprise Account Management

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