Golden Quarter Could Expose Merchants Flying Blind On VAMP, Warns Chargebacks911

Nearly one-third of merchants cannot say whether the Visa Acquirer Monitoring Program (VAMP) is affecting their business

TAMPA, Fla. — With the Golden Quarter fast approaching, new research from Chargebacks911, a global leader in dispute resolution and chargeback management, suggests that a significant proportion of merchants are heading into the peak trading period without knowing whether their dispute volumes are already pushing them toward Visa's compliance thresholds.

The 2026 Chargeback Field Report, based on proprietary survey data from more than 250 merchants, finds that only 20% of merchants say they have been directly impacted by changes to the Visa Acquirer Monitoring Program (VAMP), while nearly one-third cannot say whether the changes are affecting them at all. Just 26.8% say they actively monitor the TC40 fraud records that feed into their VAMP chargeback ratio.

Dispute volumes across retail and eCommerce typically rise during peak trading periods. For merchants already approaching VAMP thresholds, that seasonal increase could be enough to change their compliance position.

"Merchants heading into Golden Quarter without visibility of their VAMP standing are taking a risk they may not fully understand," said Monica Eaton, Founder and CEO of Chargebacks911. "Dispute volumes typically rise during peak trading periods. For merchants already approaching thresholds, that increase could push them into territory that carries real consequences. The time to understand your position is before the peak, certainly not after."

VAMP consolidated Visa's two existing chargeback monitoring programs into a single framework with revised risk thresholds and expanded compliance expectations for acquirers and merchants. Yet despite the program being live, awareness and active monitoring remain limited across the merchant community.

"You cannot manage a compliance threshold you don't know you're approaching," said Eaton. "VAMP is a live program with real consequences for merchants who find themselves on the wrong side of the thresholds it sets. The merchants most at risk right now are not necessarily those with the highest dispute volumes but those with the least visibility into where those volumes are heading."

The broader compliance picture from the Field Report reinforces the concern. More than half of merchants say they have little to no knowledge of card network rules overall. Only 23% describe themselves as very informed on the subject. Among small businesses, that figure falls to 17.4%. The rules that determine whether a merchant is operating within acceptable parameters are, for a significant proportion of those merchants, effectively unknown.

That gap is becoming harder to sustain. As programs like VAMP set expectations around dispute and fraud ratios, staying current on card network requirements is increasingly a matter of operational standing rather than administrative compliance. Merchants who adapt are better positioned; those who do not may find their standing with acquirers and processors quietly shifting in ways that are difficult to reverse.

"The challenge with compliance programs is that merchants often assume someone else is watching," said Eaton. "Sometimes an acquirer provides some level of oversight, but the merchant still carries the exposure. Finding out you have a problem through a formal notice rather than through your own monitoring means the opportunity to act earlier has already been lost."

ResolveLab provides the continuous, real-time performance measurement merchants need to track their dispute activity, monitor emerging trends and understand their compliance position before thresholds become consequences, giving merchants the ongoing feedback that makes compliance visible rather than retrospective. Chargebacks911's Unified Dispute Management System (UDMS) applies AI and machine learning across the full dispute lifecycle, connecting the data points merchants need to understand not just what their dispute volumes are, but what is driving them.

"My advice to merchants is not to wait for a notice," said Eaton. "Monitor the data that determines your standing before anyone else flags it. That is the difference between managing compliance and being managed by it."

The complete 2026 Chargeback Field Report is available at https://chargebacks911.com/chargeback-field-report.

For more information about Chargebacks911 or its chargeback prevention and remediation solutions, visit www.chargebacks911.com or email info@chargebacks911.com.

About Chargebacks911

Founded in 2011, Chargebacks911 is the first global company fully dedicated to remediating chargebacks at scale. As industry-leading innovators, Chargebacks911 is credited with developing the most effective solutions for helping businesses manage disputes, remain compliant, and reduce loss in various industries and sectors within the payments space. 

Chargebacks911 provides comprehensive and highly-scalable platform solutions for issuers, acquirers, and their customers - managing chargebacks, related services and post transaction workflows. The company helps decrease the negative impact of chargebacks and provides real-time API connectivity, configurable white-labelled interfaces, and actionable insights, thereby improving revenue retention using data-driven technology to help ensure sustainable growth for every member of the payment channel.    Chargebacks911’s unparalleled category experience and patented Intelligence Source Detection (ISD™) technology help identify the true source of chargebacks, automatically remediates fraudulently filed disputes, safeguards reputations, monitors feedback 24/7 and provides insight to proactively prevent future fraud. www.chargebacks911.com