The current pandemic situation has given rise to e-commerce. Because people cannot go outside in crowded shopping malls and have to maintain SOPs, the online shopping trends have increased. Taking the present condition into consideration, business companies have moved online. Where this drift towards e-commerce has thrived the online businesses, it has also introduced cyber threats and identity frauds.
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Scams in the digital world are frequent now. Even though the companies are actively trying to provide control against this, without an address verification system we cannot make sure if the customers are adding their real addresses and not committing any fraud. The most prevalent type of fraud in e-commerce is friendly fraud, which is what online address verification has to tackle.
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Customer satisfaction doesn’t always come at first
Friendly fraud may sound like a very misleading term, but this kind of fraud happens when a customer makes a purchase while adding a different address from the one mentioned in the identity card, receives the package from that specified address, and claims that he has never bought that item. Customer contacts the cardholders and declares that he has been a victim of identity theft, targeted by a fraudster, telling that he has lost the money and that item has never been purchased from his side.
For cardholders, customer service comes at first and they don’t bear any negligence in this regard. They don’t want any customer to walk out of the door, unhappy. To maintain the excellent quality of their services, they work all the way to help the customers with their queries and problems, which eventually becomes the cause of friendly fraud. Business holders suffer greatly from this type of fraud.
First, they lose their reputation which is literally the most important aspect of a business, second, they lose the money from the chargeback, this may seem ordinary but picture the product being bought is a BMW car, third, they lose the product they have sold to that customer, which is horrifying for small business owners, selling their craftwork online, investing all of their time and money in the product. In all types of friendly frauds, the occurrence ratio of friendly frauds is 60-70%.
The Solution: Add an Online Address Verification
AI-powered address verification ensures that the person has added the right address. It checks and evaluates the address entered by the user with his authentic document, e.g. address information from his identity document, provided by the government. If the address added by the customer matches the address mentioned in the identity documents, then the verification results will show that the address is correct, else, it will display ‘wrong address’.
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Online Address Verification Is Crucial In E-Commerce
Consider the example scenario above. If there was a system that has verification of address installed in it, then the user can’t commit friendly fraud. The system will not let the user complete the purchase if the process of verifying an address detects errors from the customer’s side, thus preventing fraud.
Online Address Verification: Validate address before completing the checkout process
How can online address verification prevent friendly frauds?
Verifying addresses on e-commerce websites is important. Introducing online address verification on e-commerce websites can prevent friendly frauds. If the user cannot provide a different address from the one in his identity documents then he cannot claim that he has not received the parcel. And because the identity is verified through his government documents, he cannot declare that his identity is being forged or the credit card information is being stolen by someone.
Cardholders should investigate the case before chargebacks
Apart from online address verification checks in e-commerce websites, cardholders should also properly examine the case and run an authentic background check on customers, before filing chargebacks.
Human errors
Moreover, some people may also enter the wrong addresses unintentionally. This is not a fraud and customers may not even know that they have given wrong information in the check-out process. For this, an online address verification can not only verify the addresses but can also provide an autofill feature in the check-out process. Computers do not possess any chance of errors. If the websites extract the address from the authentic documents provided by the user and fill the address and related information fields automatically, then such human errors can be reduced.
Concluding Remarks: Online Address Verification Can Tackle Friendly Frauds
Websites that verify addresses on the cart information can stop human errors and frauds. Correctly added address verify and give you a pass to continue the checkout process. Address verification is a practical, efficient and convenient approach for providing a secure online shopping experience.
