Each card network has its own process for handling disputes between cardholders and merchants, but at a high level they're all similar.

When a customer files a dispute, the disputed amount plus the dispute fee is immediately pulled from your account balance until the card network reaches a decision. Neither Stripe nor Tekmetric plays any part in the dispute decision itself, but does provide tools to help you challenge the dispute to give you the best chance of winning.

An email is sent from payments@tekmetric.com to the Account Representative listed in your Tekmetric Payments account. The Account Representative's name and email address can be found by navigating to Payments → Account and scrolling down to Management and ownership. 

You are also notified within Tekmetric both within Notifications and the Payments section:

Example of in-app notification:

Example of the notification and message in the Payments section: 

Since the card network debits Stripe for your disputed payment and related dispute fees when a chargeback is filed, Stripe in turn debits your balance. The funds are returned to your balance if you counter and win the dispute. 

When you receive a dispute, you have to decide if you want to challenge it. 

• Review the dispute and the dispute claim to decide if you think the dispute is valid. 
• Assess if you have evidence to counter the dispute. 
• If you choose not to challenge it, you can ignore the dispute and do nothing, or explicitly accept the dispute. 
• If you want to win a dispute, you must challenge it and submit evidence. 
• Taking no action is treated as accepting the dispute.

Accepting a dispute will immediately close the dispute as lost. Since acceptance signifies your agreement to the dispute, the funds are not returned to you.

For more information about accepting a dispute, see Stripe's Accepting Disputes FAQ.

Yes. Some card issuers will treat failure to submit evidence as an acceptance of liability. To be safe, you should always submit evidence contesting the reason for the dispute.

You have just one opportunity to submit evidence, so it’s important to gather everything you need before submitting, since you can’t go back and add evidence once you’ve submitted

Disputes are decided entirely by the entity who issued the cardholder's card. In some cases that's the card network itself (as with American Express) and in some cases that's an issuing bank (as with Mastercard or Visa).

The card network (such as Visa, Mastercard, or American Express) defines the dispute process -- the "rules of the road" for how disputes work. The issuer decides whether any given dispute is won or lost. In some cases (as with American Express) these are the same entity.

Stripe facilitates your participation in the dispute process by helping you select the best possible evidence for the dispute reason in the dashboard, and transmitting your evidence to the card network, but Stripe does not make any decision about your dispute.

No. The issuer's decision is final and cannot be appealed or challenged. Some card networks feature a dispute lifecycle phase called "arbitration" in which a loss can be appealed (for a substantial card network fee), but Stripe does not currently support this.

It may still be possible to have your customer withdraw the dispute, even after the dispute is closed. 

While the issuer’s decision is final, you may have other legal options. See the examples below and consult with the proper professionals or governing bodies for your specific options.

• Take the Customer to Small Claims or Civil Court
• File a Police Report for Stolen Goods
• File a Mechanic’s Lien if You’re Still in Possession of the Vehicle
• File a Business Insurance Claim

The customer's bank makes a single, final decision about whether the dispute is won or lost based on the evidence you give. Due to card brands' rules, Tekmetric is unable to change the issuer's decision concerning the dispute. 

To view or download the issuing bank’s detailed decision for a dispute in Tekmetric, follow these steps:

1. Navigate to Payments → Disputes in Tekmetric.
2. Select the specific dispute you want to review.
3. Click on “View issuing bank response”. This will open or download a PDF containing the bank’s detailed decision. Additionally, you can contact the Payments team for guidance on handling disputes and preparing evidence. Ensure that any documentation prepared removes customer-specific details by using placeholders such as [CUSTOMER_NAME] or [INVOICE_NUMBER] to maintain privacy.

Two main factors impact the lifecycle of a dispute and its resolution time: your initial response time to the dispute, and the issuer's evaluation of challenged disputes.

Following the creation of the dispute, you have a limited amount of time, usually 7-21 days (depending on the card network), to respond to the issuer. The sooner you respond (ie., accept or challenge the dispute), the sooner the dispute will be resolved.

If you do challenge (ie. submit evidence), the issuer then has a limited amount of time to evaluate the evidence and decide the outcome, usually 60–75 days (depending on the card network). The decision is made by the issuer during this period, and Stripe has no impact on the issuer's timeline for this review. Once Stripe receives the issuer's decision, the dispute will automatically be updated to reflect the resolution.

Ultimately, the full lifecycle of a dispute, from initiation to the final decision from the issuer, can take as long as 2-3 months to complete. There are no actions you can take to reliably accelerate this timeline, other than by accepting the dispute in the Dashboard or API to resolve the dispute in the customer's favor.

In most cases, the cardholder receives the funds for a dispute as soon as they initiate it with their issuer, but it's hard to set reliable expectations around this.

When an issuer creates a chargeback on the card network, the network immediately pulls back the funds from Stripe and returns them to the issuer. The issuer may or may not credit the funds back to the cardholder at this time, while the dispute outcome is still pending. If the issuer decides the dispute in your favor, the network pulls the funds back from their cardholder and returns them to Stripe. If the issuer decides in their cardholder's favor, the issuer keeps the funds that were originally debited from Stripe, which either reimburses the issuer for the funds they already credited their cardholder, or goes to the cardholder at this point, if the issuer did not already credit them

Customers are able to open multiple disputes on the same transaction. Each dispute should be treated as a separate dispute, and you can decide to accept or counter the dispute. We recommend reviewing the disputed amount, category, claim details, and timelines very carefully to understand the complaint and respond effectively.

See Receiving multiple disputes per payment FAQ for the most common reasons for multiple disputes on one payment. 

You may receive an inquiry about a customer payment. An inquiry is a preliminary phase during which a card network gathers information before deciding to open a chargeback dispute. 

Failing to respond to an inquiry can signal to the issuer your implicit acceptance of the claim, resulting in escalation to a formal,  likely unwinnable chargeback. Unless you intend to accept financial liability, always respond to inquiries immediately, making every effort to amicably resolve issues with your customer during this stage.

Since you no longer have access to respond to a dispute, please reply to the email notification with any relevant information about the transaction in question. This can include any pertinent information surrounding the customer or transaction in question, offline communication with the customer (text or emails not within the Tekmetric dashboard), or any photos that may not be available within the Tekmetric dashboard.