Visa VAMP Explained for Subscription Businesses

VAMP, the Visa Acquirer Monitoring Program, is how Visa decides whether your fraud and dispute levels are too high. It adds your fraud reports and disputes together and divides them by your settled card-not-present transactions. If you're a merchant in the US, Canada, EU or Asia Pacific, you're flagged as Excessive at a VAMP ratio of 1.5% with at least 1,500 fraud reports and disputes in a month (Visa). That's lower than the 2.2% it started at, and lower than a lot of subscription businesses expect.

Subscription businesses feel VAMP more than most. Renewals, trials and "I forgot I signed up" disputes all land in the same number. This guide covers how the ratio works, the thresholds, and the levers that actually move it. Last reviewed against Visa and Stripe documentation on November 4, 2026.

What VAMP is and what it replaced

Visa consolidated three programs into one: the old VAMP, the Visa Fraud Monitoring Program (VFMP) and the Visa Dispute Monitoring Program (VDMP). The new thresholds took effect on June 1, 2025, with an advisory period that ran to September 30, 2025 (fact sheet). Brazil, Chile and India get their own programs later.

Each month, Visa checks fraud, disputes and card testing levels, then identifies acquirers and merchants over the thresholds. Anyone identified has to put risk controls in place.

How the VAMP ratio is calculated

Visa's formula is simple (fact sheet):

VAMP ratio = (fraud reports + disputes) ÷ settled transactions

• Fraud reports are TC40 reports: an issuer telling Visa a transaction was fraudulent. Stripe shows these as early fraud warnings.

• Disputes are TC15 reports, fraud and non-fraud alike.

• Settled transactions are TC05 records on card-not-present Visa transactions, domestic and cross-border.

Three details catch people out:

• It counts, it doesn't weigh. A $5 dispute counts the same as a $500 one. Low-price subscriptions with lots of small disputes get hit hard.

• Double counting. A transaction that gets a fraud report and a dispute counts twice (Stripe).

• Outcomes don't matter. Winning a dispute doesn't remove it from the count. Monitoring programs care about how many disputes you prevent, not how many you win.

Two things are excluded: disputes resolved through pre-dispute solutions, and TC40 fraud that qualifies for Visa Compelling Evidence 3.0 (CE 3.0), both depending on the timing of Visa's data extract.

Illustrative example only: a subscription app settles 120,000 Visa transactions in a month and receives 900 fraud reports and 1,100 disputes. Its VAMP count is 2,000 and its ratio is 1.67%. In the US, that's over both the 1.5% ratio and the 1,500 count, so it would be identified as Excessive.

VAMP thresholds

Merchant thresholds

Source: Visa VAMP fact sheet. Stripe's documentation also lists a lower "Non-compliant" level, a 0.5% ratio with as few as 5 fraud reports and disputes, where Visa may assess fees (Stripe). Treat 0.5% as the line where you start getting attention, not 1.5%.

Acquirer thresholds

Visa also measures your acquirer's whole portfolio. It's Above Standard at 0.5% and Excessive at 0.7% (fact sheet). That's why acquirers and payment platforms often act long before you hit the merchant threshold. Your ratio affects their standing with Visa.

Card testing (enumeration)

VAMP also watches card testing. You're flagged when at least 20% of your authorization attempts, and at least 300,000 attempts in the month, are enumeration. Visa doesn't assess fines for enumeration monitoring, according to Stripe, but your acquirer has to deal with it. Stripe has a guide to card testing.

What happens if you're flagged

• Visa assesses fees to merchants over the Excessive threshold, and may for those over Non-compliant. Your processor usually passes them on.

• You'll be asked for a remediation plan. Stripe publishes a template for this (source).

• Your processor may add reserves, restrict your account or, if the numbers don't come down, close it.

If you're already dealing with held funds, see what to do when Stripe is holding your funds.

Why subscription businesses are exposed

• Low prices. Because VAMP counts rather than weighs, a $9.99 plan builds up counts quickly.

• Trials that convert. A customer who forgot about the trial often reports the first charge as fraud, which creates a TC40 and maybe a dispute too.

• Unrecognized charges. A billing descriptor the customer doesn't recognize turns into "I don't know this charge."

• Got-what-they-wanted disputes. Consumer tools where the value arrives in one session, like a search, a report or a generated result, see disputes after the customer is done.

• Card testing. Cheap signup flows attract bots testing stolen cards.

How to lower your VAMP ratio

1. Stop disputes before they're filed. Pre-dispute tools like Verifi RDR (Visa) resolve disputes before they count. Order Insight shares purchase details with the issuer when a customer asks about a charge (Stripe). See our comparison of Ethoca, Verifi RDR and Order Insight.

2. Qualify for CE 3.0. Fraud reports that qualify for Compelling Evidence 3.0 are excluded. That needs data on prior undisputed transactions with the same cardholder, matched on things like IP address, email or device (Stripe). Send that data with every payment.

3. Catch fraud before capture. Issuers don't have to report fraud on an authorization you never capture. Reviewing risky payments before capture keeps TC40s out (Stripe).

4. Fix the subscription basics. Clear billing terms before checkout, a trial reminder before the first charge, renewal reminders, an easy cancel button and a recognizable descriptor (Stripe).

5. Block card testing. CAPTCHA, rate limits and checks on free or low-price signups.

6. Track it weekly. Stripe's VAMP dashboard shows your daily estimate. Don't wait for Visa's month-end report.

Our guide to friendly fraud in subscription businesses goes deeper on the disputes that drive most of these numbers.

Frequently asked questions

What is the VAMP threshold for merchants?

For merchants in the US, Canada, EU and Asia Pacific, Visa's Excessive threshold is a VAMP ratio of 1.5% or higher with at least 1,500 fraud reports and disputes in the month. It dropped from 2.2% on April 1, 2026. CEMEA stays at 2.2% with at least 150 reports and USD 75,000 (Visa fact sheet).

Do refunds lower my VAMP ratio?

Not directly. Monitoring programs don't consider refunds when counting disputes (Stripe). And a fraud report (TC40) still counts even if you refund the payment afterwards. What helps is stopping the dispute from being filed at all, through pre-dispute tools, or catching fraud before you capture the payment.

Do early fraud warnings count toward VAMP?

Yes. VAMP counts fraud reports from Visa's TC40 data, which is what Stripe shows as early fraud warnings, regardless of outcome. A payment that gets both a fraud report and a dispute counts twice (Stripe).

What replaced VDMP and VFMP?

VAMP. Visa consolidated the old VAMP, the Visa Fraud Monitoring Program and the Visa Dispute Monitoring Program into one global program, with the new thresholds effective June 1, 2025 (Visa fact sheet).

How do I check my VAMP ratio on Stripe?

Stripe has a VAMP dashboard under Radar that shows your program standing, a daily trend, Visa's reported data and Stripe's own estimates by statement descriptor (Stripe).

Worried about your VAMP ratio?

Redux works with SaaS, AI and app subscription businesses on the payment problems that come with recurring billing: disputes, VAMP exposure, authorization rates and failed renewals. We can review where your fraud reports and disputes come from and what's worth changing first. We can't promise outcomes with Visa or your processor.

Get payment help for SaaS & AI businesses

Sources

• Visa, Visa Acquirer Monitoring Program fact sheet

• Visa, VAMP announcement

• Stripe, Dispute and fraud card monitoring programs

• Stripe, How dispute prevention works

• Stripe, Visa Compelling Evidence 3.0

• Stripe, Card testing