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Card Scheme Update: Visa Acquirer Monitoring Programme (VAMP)
By Leo Li, Senior Risk Management Strategist, Antom, Ant International
The Visa Acquirer Monitoring Programme (VAMP) has come into effect from 1 April 2025. The new programme consolidates Visa's five existing programmes including Visa Dispute Monitoring Programme (VDMP) and Visa Fraud Monitoring Programme (VFMP). How will VAMP impact global merchants, and how can you prepare for it? Find out more about VAMP from Leo Li, our Senior Risk Management Strategist, in the article below.
Antom works closely with global regulatory bodies and card schemes including Visa and Mastercard to ensure our merchants are always up to date on the latest card scheme compliance requirements.
What is VAMP?
VAMP is an initiative by Visa for acquirers and merchants to manage fraud and disputes more effectively. It offers enhanced protection for consumers and provides the framework for acquirers and merchants to create a secure and conducive global commerce environment.
As global commerce and the evolving payment ecosystem becomes increasingly complex, the new VAMP aims to address four times the amount of fraud, or the equivalent of US$2.5 billion in losses for businesses, compared to previous programmes.
The programme introduces new thresholds and metrics in two important phases:
- From 1 April 2025: A six-month advisory period
- From 1 January 2026: Stringent enforcement in place
Key components of VAMP for merchants
VAMP will assess both merchants and acquirers based on their ratio of fraud and disputes, divided by their total number of transactions processed, and their total number of transactions affected by enumeration attacks, as identified by Visa's Account Attack Intelligence system. The following are the key components of VAMP for merchants.
- VAMP Ratio measures fraudulent and disputed transactions against total settled transactions. It is applicable to Card Not Present transactions and is calculated monthly.
VAMP ratio = (Monthly number of transactions reported as fraud + number of non-fraud disputes) / (Monthly number of settled transactions) - Enumeration Ratio incorporates the impact of card testing or enumeration attacks for better fraud control. With enumeration losses costing global businesses $1.1 billion annually, it's key to take into account card testing attacks for effective anti-fraud strategies.
Enumeration ratio = Confirmed number of enumerated transactions / Total number of settled transactions - Stricter compliance thresholds and enforcement will also be in place to safeguard businesses and consumers. More stringent thresholds based on VAMP and enumeration ratios will form new benchmarks, with acquirers and merchants facing penalties and possible termination from Visa's network.
Merchant VAMP thresholds triggering enforcement actions
|
Effective date |
VAMP Ratio |
Enumeration Ratio |
|
From 1 April 2025 |
>1.50% |
>20% |
|
From 1 January 2026 |
>0.90% |
>20% |
Merchants need to ensure their VAMP ratio is less than 1.5% and enumeration ratio is less than 20% in order not to trigger enforcement actions from Visa. VAMP will have a six-month advisory period before full enforcement beginning 1 October 2025 and more stringent thresholds taking effect from 1 January 2026. Exceeding these thresholds will lead to potential fines and termination of merchant accounts.
A three-month grace period will be granted to first-time offenders for a rolling 12-month period. After which, if a merchant exceeds the VAMP thresholds, the merchant will be fined 10 USD per fraudulent or disputed transaction.
With VAMP impact both domestic and cross-border Card Not Present transactions, it's essential for global merchants to keep up with card scheme updates including VAMP. Antom shares more on Why Global Merchants Need to Keep Up with Card Scheme Updates with Merchant Risk Council (MRC).
How merchants can prepare for VAMP requirements
Regulatory bodies and card schemes play a pivotal role in fostering a conducive global commerce environment by establishing and enforcing standards that ensure security, fairness, and efficiency in financial transactions.
Regulatory bodies, such as central banks and financial authorities, set guidelines to prevent fraud, promote transparency, and protect consumer interests, which instills trust in payment systems and cross-border trade. Meanwhile, card schemes like Visa and Mastercard create robust frameworks for standardized payment processing, providing global interoperability and seamless transactional experiences for businesses and consumers alike.
VAMP is a continuing effort by Visa to do so in an ever-evolving e-commerce landscape. Global merchants already have certain risk management and anti-fraud strategies in place and may even be utilising dispute and chargeback solutions offered by payment providers and card schemes.
1. Effective risk management strategy
Fraud is and will continue to be an issue that businesses need to pay attention to. Even more so with tech advancements, more sophisticated fraud strategies and AI tools now at the disposal of fraudsters. Every business needs to have a risk management strategy in place.
With VAMP, fraudulent transactions, disputes and chargebacks will have an even bigger impact on businesses. Without an effective risk strategy, businesses risk potential penalties and business account termination by card networks – and on top of those, negative impacts on business continuity, brand reputation and customer trust.
Antom Shield provides two multi-levels of fraud protection as the option to merchants. On one level, using Antom's risk management platform to implement overall risk coverage with the relevant risk rules in place. Merchants can also adopt auto-decisions by using machine learning and AI technology via Antom Shield. This forms an effective risk strategy to help keep fraud rates low.
2. Dispute and chargeback resolution
Disputes and chargebacks can cost businesses both operationally and in terms of their relationships with customers. RDR (Rapid Dispute Resolution) and CDRN (Chargeback Dispute Resolution Network) are two services commonly used by businesses to effectively manage chargebacks and disputes. Visa offers RDR and CDRN via its Verifi subsidiary.
Merchants may also utilise the RDR solution via Antom's platform without additional integration, with flexible definition and configuration of refund rules through the Antom Dashboard. Meanwhile, CDRN is a service designed to give merchants an opportunity to respond to customer disputes before they become formal chargebacks.
CDRN notifies merchants of disputes early in the process, allowing them to resolve the issue –whether through communication or issuing refunds – before it escalates into a financial penalty or chargeback. This proactive approach keeps merchants in control of the resolution process, ensuring compliance and retention of customer trust.
3. Proactively address common chargeback causes
Disputes and chargebacks can also occur because of reasons such as misleading product description, confusing delivery dates and lack of after-sales customer support.
Customers who aren't able to reach the correct business teams then file a dispute or chargeback. Some cases can be avoided. As part of an optimised checkout process, businesses should also aim to be clear in their communications whether considering the local contexts, language localisation and easy-to-understand checkout processes, to simply lower the chances of chargebacks.
You may also check out Top Fraud Trends Global Businesses Need to Pay Attention to in 2025.
Speak with our team today to learn more about card scheme updates and how your business can keep up with global regulatory updates.
