Reason codes / Fraudulent Transaction
The hardest code on the list, and the one where the honest advice is usually to stand down. Here is when fighting makes sense, and what to do with the hour you save when it does not.
The cardholder told their bank the card was used without their permission, or the bank's own fraud model flagged the charge and filed on their behalf. Either way, the bank has classified this as unauthorized card use. It is not a complaint about your product, your shipping, or your prices, and that classification is why this code plays by different rules than every other dispute.
Fraudulent transaction disputes are the hardest to win. Banks default to the cardholder. Two exceptions worth fighting: CE 3.0 eligibility (see above), and orders that ran through 3D Secure: authenticated transactions generally leave fraud liability with the issuer. Without either, accept the loss and focus on prevention: AVS, CVV, and 3D Secure stop most stolen-card fraud before a dispute ever files.
The analyst starts from the assumption that their cardholder was defrauded. Delivery confirmations, product photos, and refund policies do not move that assumption, because none of them answer the only question on the table: did the real cardholder authorize this charge?
Two arguments actually answer it. The first is purchase history. If the same card placed orders 120 to 365 days before this dispute that were never disputed, and those orders share this order's IP address or device ID plus one more matching detail, Visa's Compelling Evidence 3.0 rules oblige the issuer to weigh that history seriously.
The second is authentication. If the order ran through 3D Secure, liability for true fraud generally sits with the issuer rather than with you. An authenticated fraud dispute is usually the issuer's problem, not yours.
Without either, the math is against you. Responding costs a fee and an afternoon to chase the low end of a 9 to 17 percent win range, and small merchants without enterprise fraud tooling live at that low end.
Authenticated orders generally shift fraud liability to the issuer. This single fact can turn an unwinnable code into a strong response.
Two undisputed orders placed 120 to 365 days back, sharing this order's IP address or device ID plus one more data element, is the Compelling Evidence 3.0 pattern: the one evidence package banks accept for this code.
Submitting weak evidence to a fraud code does not earn a partial win. It adds a response fee to a loss you were already taking.
AVS, CVV, and 3D Secure stop most stolen-card fraud at checkout, before a dispute can ever be filed. Blocking the next one is worth more than fighting this one.
A dispute response locks the moment it is submitted, yours orShopify’s automatic one, with no edits after. Whatever goes in first is your whole case, which is why the first hour matters more than the last day.
No. The 9 to 17 percent industry win range means most responses lose after costing a fee and your time. Fight when you have Compelling Evidence 3.0 history or 3D Secure authentication. Otherwise put the energy into prevention, which actually works.
A Visa rule for card-not-present fraud disputes. Show two prior orders on the same card, each 120 to 365 days before the dispute, never disputed, sharing at least two data elements with the disputed order, where one match is IP address or device ID. Meet that bar and the issuer must weigh the history. Since October 2025, Visa also auto-qualifies Visa Secure authenticated transactions.
For this code, very little. Delivery proves a package arrived somewhere, not that the cardholder placed the order. A fraudster shipping to their own address produces perfect delivery evidence, and banks know it, so delivery proof does not carry a fraud dispute.
It tells you the truth. When a fraudulent-code dispute syncs in, Backstop shows the skip recommendation and the two exceptions, assembles what order evidence exists, and leaves the decision with you. It will not talk you into a fight the numbers say you lose.
Backstop syncs the dispute in, labels it with this code's honest odds, and shows the two exceptions next to your order's actual data. If the case is worth fighting, the evidence pack is already assembled. If it is not, it says so, which is rarer than it should be in this industry.
Install in under a minute. Free to watch; evidence packs are $19/month after a 14-day trial, cancel in one click.
Install on Shopify
Backstop
Shopify
Shopify
Shopify