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Key takeaways
- If you see an unauthorized charge on your credit card, dispute it with your card issuer.
- The issuer is required to look into the matter and give you an explanation if it denies your dispute, as well as provide any documents that support its decision if you ask for them.
- If you don’t agree with the bank’s decision, you can dispute it further, seek legal counsel and file complaints with the appropriate agencies.
If you have an issue with a charge on your credit card statement, you can turn to your issuer to resolve the matter. The bank is legally required to look into your dispute and give you a report about what it finds. However, consumers often don’t get any concrete feedback about such investigations.
Complaints about credit or consumer reporting continued to increase in 2023, accounting for more than 81 percent of all consumer complaints sent to companies, according to the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau (CFPB). The CFPB sent nearly 1.1 million credit or consumer reporting complaints to companies for review and response. Three nationwide consumer reporting agencies — Equifax, Experian and TransUnion — accounted for more than one million of these complaints.
How do credit card companies investigate disputed charges?
Once you dispute a charge with a card issuer, the clock starts ticking, because your issuerit has 30 days to acknowledge receipt of it and 90 days to complete itstheir investigation. YourAn issuer will ask you to share any documentation on the disputed charge.
The card issuer will also look at your card’sfactors including transaction history, contacting the merchant for evidence, including security footage and receipts and using automated tools to detect potential fraud.
What happens if a credit dispute is denied?
A credit card issuer may reject your dispute after an investigation. But that doesn’t mean that the dispute is over. There are more steps you can take if you feel that the issuer’s decision is incorrect.
You can appeal the decision with the issuer within 10 days of being notified about it or before the deadline for you to pay the disputed amount, whichever comes later. You also have the right to ask the issuer for the documents used by the issuer to deny your claim.
It may also be a good idea to consult with an attorney about how to follow up. While this can get costly, if they file a case that is resolved in your favor, you could be awarded damages and also have your attorney’s fees covered.
The issuer can report your account as delinquent to the three credit bureaus if you haven’t made the minimum paymentpaid up by the due datewithin the time the issuer allowed you and start collection activity on the amount due from you. However, your issuerit should also note to the bureaus that you are disputing the billing error.
Bankrate insight
If you believe your issuer failed to investigate the dispute in a timely manner, consider filing a complaint with the CFPB, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) or your state attorney general’s office or consumer protection agency.
Fair Credit Reporting Act rights
In case you believe that you are not responsible for a charge on your credit card, know that consumers have rights under the Fair Credit Billing Act and Fair Credit Reporting Act. If someone used your card without your authorization or stole your identity to open a card account and run up charges, for instance, you can dispute the charges.
In these cases, the card issuer should conduct a reasonable investigation and review all the information you provide. The investigation should be completed within 90 days of receiving your dispute notification. If it deniescides to deny your dispute, the issuer should contact you and give you an explanation for the denial. If you ask for it, the lender should also give you any documentary evidence that shows you are responsible for the debt.
However, if the issuer deems the dispute to be a frivolous one, it is not required to investigate the matter.
The Fair Credit Billing Act has a $50 cardholder liability cap for credit card fraud. If the victim can show that they’ve lost more than this, they won’t have to pay more than this amount.
Obstruction of investigation
The CFPB advises that card issuers (and credit reporting agencies) cannot shirk their responsibility to carry out a reasonable investigation by asking consumers to “satisfy demands other than those specified by statute or regulation.”
For one, a card issuer cannot ask for specific additional documents before conducting an investigation other than those required to look into the matter. If you have submitted adequate documentation and evidence to conduct an investigation, a lender cannot ask you for more information. Lenders also cannot ask you to complete a “proprietary form” before undertaking an investigation, the CFPB says.
The bottom line
If you dispute an unauthorized card transaction with a bank, the law requires the card issuer to look into the matter and conduct a reasonable investigation. It cannot ask for information from you other than that required to carry out the investigation.
Once the investigation is done, the issuer is required to give you a reason for the denial and provide you with any documents that support its decision if you ask for them. In case you don’t agree with the issuer’s decision, you can dispute it to agencies including the CFPB, the FTC or your state’s attorney general.
If you’re still not satisfied, you could consult an attorney to determine if you have a case against the bank.
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