SCA regulations: A call to action for the payments industry

Today, online shoppers in the UK face more identification checks when paying for purchases on the internet as SCA rules to clamp down on fraud come into force.

George Ralchev, Head of Risk at online, mobile and POS payment service provider, emerchantpay, said: “Reducing fraud in online retail is a key priority for the payments industry and we welcome the introduction of Strong Customer Authentication (SCA). The industry is expecting some merchants to see teething issues with the new requirement, which could disrupt their checkouts. It’s the responsibility of the payments industry to support merchants during the transition period to ensure their payments systems are optimised and able to cope with the new checks. Ultimately, the SCA enforcement should lead to fewer fraudulent transactions, and reduced costs related with processing fraudulent transactions, refunds and chargebacks. With the right level of support from payment providers, merchants should see the benefits of SCA very quickly.”