Swiss fintech payments provider, Rivero recently launched its exciting new product ‘amiko’ to all of its European customers.

Amiko is essentially the world’s first end-to-end digital chargeback solution. Chargeback is a common but incredibly technical form of transaction where the bank forcefully initiates a refund from a proprietor’s account to their customers’ accounts. Chargebacks are more stringent than traditional refunds in the way that the bank does not ask for the proprietor’s permission before initiating them. They are considered an efficient way of curbing sales fraud and solving common problems faced while fulfilling a payment, but are often under/over-utilised by customers owing to their highly technical nature.

Rivero’s innovative end-to-end Chargeback option was launched in association with Viseca payment services, the organisation that issues and manages the debit and credit cards issued by major companies like Mastercard, Visa and Amex. The company also provides modern financial solutions to various organizations around the world under the brand ‘Contovista.’ Viseca’s head operations risk manager, Patrick Dessouslavy summarised the move:

“Continuous improvement in our back-office processes and customer’s services is essential for us. We were looking for a solution that helps us to improve the efficiency in our chargeback process and offering cardholder self-servicing, without dependency on our payment processor and huge IT costs”

About Viseca

Viseca has previously pioneered contactless payments on the Samsung Pay platform for all Viseca cardholders. Since 2019, these payments can be made at any NFC enabled store across the globe. The integration project that led to amiko was started in 2020 with the aim of simplifying chargeback transactions for a large number of Rivero’s customers.

A chargeback transaction is initiated when a cardholder initiates a dispute claim. Upon receiving the claim, the issuer sends the money back to the acquirer electronically. The acquirer then either resolves the claim themselves or sends it to the merchant. The merchant can then either accept the chargeback or fight the claim by sending compelling evidence to the acquirer. The acquirer and the issuer both review this evidence and then come to a final decision.

This is a long, arduous process that takes up a lot of time and resources. With an increasing number of people gaining easy access to the internet and hence opting for convenient, electronic monetary transactions, the number of people filing chargeback claims is on the rise.

Analysis

Industry leaders like Mastercard and Visa have been looking for an elegant solution to this problem for a while now. Along with providing new, revolutionary services to the customers, the fintech boom of 2021 has also been characterised by companies coming up with better and far more efficient solutions for existing problems.

Companies like Robinhood and PayUp are essentially working towards making the already commonplace practice of stock trading even more accessible for their Millenial and Gen-Z consumers. Debit and credit card payments, while incredibly efficient, can seem old-fashioned in comparison to the newer forms of payment like Klarna’s Buy Now, Pay Later option. Companies like Rivero have been trying to change that by spearheading research in the sector.

Affiliation with credible names like Amex and Visa has translated into avid investor interest and a constant supply of funding for these companies. Along with the newer names like Stripe and Klarna that have recently made it big in the sector, the growth of established fintech corporations will also be key in deciding the rate of economic recovery in Europe. 2021 is already being dubbed as the “golden year for tech” in the continent.

Finding itself at the intersection of the two highly lucrative markets of tech and finance, fintech companies are expected to have a great run in Europe for the coming years.