High-risk payments reference
The codes your processor sends back, the verticals underwriters flag, and the infrastructure that keeps you processing through both.
Chargeback reason codes
90 codesEvery dispute arrives with a reason code that decides what evidence wins and how long you have to file it.
Card decline codes
37 codesWhat the issuer response actually means, whether the retry is safe, and what it costs your MID when you get it wrong.
- 01Refer to Card Issuer
- 02Refer to Card Issuer, Special Condition
- 03Invalid Merchant
- 04Pick Up Card
- 05Do Not Honor
- 06Error
- 07Pick Up Card, Special Condition (Fraud)
- 12Invalid Transaction
- 13Invalid Amount
- 14Invalid Card Number
- 15No Such Issuer
- 19Re-enter Transaction
- 25Unable to Locate Record
- 28File Temporarily Unavailable
- 30Format Error
- 41Lost Card
- 43Stolen Card
- 46Closed Account
- 51Insufficient Funds
- 54Expired Card
- 55Incorrect PIN
- 57Transaction Not Permitted to Cardholder
- 58Transaction Not Permitted to Terminal
- 59Suspected Fraud
- 61Exceeds Withdrawal Amount Limit
- 62Restricted Card
- 63Security Violation
- 65Activity Limit Exceeded / Authentication Required
- 75PIN Tries Exceeded
- 78Blocked, First Use
- 82Negative CAM, dCVV, iCVV, or CVV Results
- 85No Reason to Decline
- 91Issuer or Switch Inoperative
- 92Unable to Route Transaction
- 93Transaction Cannot Be Completed, Violation of Law
- 94Duplicate Transaction
- 96System Malfunction
High-risk industry guides
12 verticalsEvery vertical gets flagged for different reasons and needs different infrastructure to stay live.
Deep dives
12 posts- Subscription and Continuity Payment Processing: Billing Forever Without Losing the Account
- Coaching and Info Product Payment Processing: High Tickets, Thin Evidence
- Vape and E-Cigarette Payment Processing: No Easy On-Ramp, Ever
- CBD Payment Processing: Banking a Federally Legal Product Nobody Wants to Underwrite
- Firearms and Ammunition Payment Processing: Legal to Sell, Hard to Bank
- Kratom Payment Processing: Banking a Product That Is Legal in One State and Banned in the Next
- Peptide Payment Processing: Why Research Peptides Are the Hardest Nutra Vertical to Bank
- Why Stripe, PayPal, and Square Shut Down High-Risk Accounts (And What To Do Before It Happens)
- Token Vaults: Why Your Customer Cards Shouldn't Live Inside Your PSP
- MID Load Balancing: How Multi-MID Routing Keeps High-Risk Brands Processing
- The High-Risk Merchant Account Landscape: Aggregators, Dedicated MIDs, and Offshore
- Chargeback Ratio Math: How VAMP and ECM Thresholds Actually Work