Quote:
Originally Posted by MisterPeabody
Scrubs exist Far-L, and 'spreading out the pain' a la the 'rolling blackouts' California experienced a few years back (remember Enron?) is standard practice for a Third Party Processer.
In other words, a processer knows, in general, an account's average volume. Very few 'established' long-term accounts flucuate wildly week-to-week. So calculating how to increase a scrub here, decrease it there, etc etc is all part of the merch account game.
But to blame a processer for this IS wrong, I believe, and that's where I agree with you Far-L. But to just think it's not happening is also wrong. Knowing a processer is scrubbing hard at a particular time helps webmasters to know when to switch between multiple processers, in an attempt to stay one step ahead in this crazy online sales game. (I should add that VOLUME of sales is probably the biggest factor in who does and doesn't feel the scrub the most.)
Of course, there are some days when ALL processers seem to be scrubbing hard, so.....LOL You just gotta stay on top of patterns and, when in doubt, swap 'em out. Having said that, companies like CCBill and Epoch are doing what's in the best interest for them AND you, the webmaster, so "blaming" them is not fair. It's a balancing act.
Cascades and multiple processers exist for a reason.  |
Ok, "scrub" exists but not in the sense of "penalty and reward". Scrub has to do with setting parameter thresholds for risky transactions, which I know you know but just making it clear for everyone. People talk about CCbill like they set a scrub in order to tolerate more bad transactions rather what it really is, a way to increase good transactions.
So, to be more specific, the way it works for processors like CCBill, where that risk is spread across the entire roster of clients, that risk balancing act "scrub" is always going to play in favor of the client, rather than against, because of the volume and average of good transactions which is part of why CCbill can charge the premium that is does.
CCbill is just as averse, if not more so, to chargebacks and other problem billing issues because they have to keep in good stead with MC/visa, so CCbill is not going to allow charges to go through that aren't up to snuff regardless.
So one small site that say does 10 transactions in a day and 3 of those get a CB, and another site that does 1000 transactions in a day only gets 3 chargebacks, the amount of overall CBs between the two is not going to make CCbill lose its status with MC/visa but CCbill is still going to be wondering what is causing the one site to chargeback at such a high rate regardless.
When a company has its own merch account then of course there are more controls over the scrub but more vigilance is required, another reason third party processors charge so much more but then of course everyone also BENEFITS rather than gets penalized by that knowledge and experience adjusting those thresholds to stay in compliance.