A quick guide for online dating merchants

As everyday life shifts more and more into the online world, dating has travelled to the web as well. Nowadays, finding a date on an app/website is more common than meeting someone “the old-fashioned way”. There is plenty of different types of dating-related websites/apps, but some of them could be quite ambiguous offering misleading services. So, firstly, let’s find out what can constitute an online dating business.

What is considered to be an online dating merchant?

The most common online dating businesses are the following:

• Dating apps;
• Dating websites;
• Online matchmaking services;
• Niche dating sites.

Dating apps/website creators usually take into consideration various different factors, such as users’ sexuality, race, religion, location, profiles, personality test or even taste in music or Facebook connections. Generally, a dating app/website will use at least one of the previously mentioned factors in order to help users find dates easier.

Why are online dating businesses considered high-risk?

If you have ever used an internet dating app/website or you own an online dating business, you will be aware that there are some extra features/services that can come with an additional price. Usually, memberships or premium features (e.g. viewing additional profile information) come with added costs. Ordering paid features seems simple for the end-user, but implementing online payments for internet dating businesses can turn out to be rather complicated; since they are considered to be high-risk, many payment service providers can be reluctant to work with them.

The main reason why online dating businesses are high risk is the increased likelihood of chargebacks. Often, in online dating, customers feel disappointed because they can’t find what they were looking for or the app/website didn’t meet their expectations. In such cases, they are likely to file a chargeback which makes the merchant responsible for their unsatisfactory experience. A high number of chargebacks might also mean that some users have forgotten to cancel their ongoing membership and instead of asking for a refund, they file a chargeback.

How can online dating merchants protect against fraud and reduce the number of chargebacks?

Looking to keep your business and customers protected? Here is a list of tips which can help to reduce fraud and chargebacks:

• Choose a payment service provider with an experienced risk management team which will help you track and notice fraudulent activities or chargeback risks.
• Be proactive when checking incoming payments and monitor your customers’ activity. For example, look out for red flags which signal that a payment can be fraudulent: sudden profile changes (photos, location, age or other information), adding or messaging a huge number of random users or using suspicious IPs.
• Integrate 3D Secure customer authentication tool. 3D Secure is an additional security check which determines if a buyer is a legitimate cardholder. It protects card data of genuine cardholders and increases customer confidence in your website.
• Make sure your customer support team is always ready to help. You can solve the majority of misunderstandings with your customers just by having a conversation. It means that your customer support team has to be helpful and attentive for even the slightest issues.
• Keep up with the payment industry’s news and insights. News websites and blogs can give you great insight into the online payment industry. A great start could be Nomupay's blog where you can find a bunch of useful blog posts on fraud and risk.

To sum up, modern life is shifting into the online world in every aspect, including dating. That is why internet dating websites and apps are on the rise at the minute. Owning a dating website/app is a profitable business model, but it comes with a number of risks, the biggest one being chargebacks. However, there is a great variety of measures which can help online businesses avoid chargebacks and possible fraud. For instance, choosing a payment service provider with an experienced risk management team will make fraud/chargeback monitoring much easier.

If you are looking for a payment service provider which can help you with fraud and chargeback prevention, check out our fraud tools for more information.