A chargeback is not a complaint. It is a customer asking their bank to reverse a payment, and the money leaves your account whether or not you agree, often weeks after the meal was eaten. You then get a short window to prove the sale was good. Most restaurants find out how this works during the first one.
🔄 How a dispute actually runs
- The customer disputes the charge with their bank, sometimes months later.
- The money is pulled back from you immediately, usually with a fee attached whatever the outcome.
- You are notified with a reason code and a deadline — often only a week or two, and it starts running whether or not anyone opened the email.
- You respond with evidence, or you accept the loss.
- The issuing bank decides. Not your processor, and not you.
Two operational conclusions. Somebody must be watching wherever those notices arrive — an unread inbox is a lost dispute. And the evidence has to already exist, because nothing useful can be created after the fact.
📑 The reasons, and what answers each one
| They say | What it usually is | What answers it |
| "I did not make this purchase" | Genuine fraud, or someone who does not recognize the name on the statement | Chip or contactless data, receipt, signature or PIN. A clear statement descriptor prevents most of these |
| "The amount is wrong" | A tip adjusted badly, or a duplicated charge | The itemized check with the tip line, and the batch record |
| "I never received it" | A delivery order | Delivery confirmation, driver record, time stamps, any message thread |
| "It was not as described" | An unhappy guest who went to the bank instead of to you | Your posted policy, the order record, and evidence you offered to fix it |
| "I was charged twice" | Usually an authorization that has not dropped off yet | Transaction records showing one capture. Often solved by a phone call before it becomes a dispute |
Keep the evidence pack together: itemized receipt, authorization and terminal data, the signed slip if there is one, delivery proof, your refund policy as displayed, and a short factual note of any contact with the customer. Send it as one clear submission, written plainly, without arguing.
🧮 When not to fight
Responding takes time, and win rates are modest. A rough rule for a small restaurant:
- Small amount, unclear evidence: accept it. An hour of your time is worth more than a $28 lunch.
- Any amount, strong evidence: respond. It takes twenty minutes with a prepared pack, and banks do decide for merchants who document properly.
- The same customer more than once: respond, and stop taking their remote orders.
- Clearly your mistake: refund before it becomes a chargeback. A refund costs you the sale; a chargeback costs you the sale plus a fee plus your ratio.
That last word matters. Processors watch the share of your transactions that end in dispute, and sustained high ratios lead to reviews, holds, and in the worst case losing your account. For a normal restaurant it is never close — but a broken delivery workflow can move it fast.
🛠️ Prevention, which is where the money is
- Fix your descriptor. What appears on the customer's statement should be the name on your sign, plus a phone number if it fits. If it currently shows a holding company or a payment brand, this single change removes a category of disputes. Call your processor today.
- Give receipts and make them itemized. Emailed or printed, both fine. A guest who can see what they ate rarely calls the bank.
- Answer the phone. Most disputes start as someone trying to reach you and giving up. Being reachable is the cheapest prevention there is.
- Discipline on tips. Adjust before the batch, every night. Tip errors are the most common legitimate dispute in this industry.
- Post your refund policy where an online customer sees it before paying, and honor it quickly.
- Keep records long enough. Eighteen months of transaction records is a reasonable habit, and your POS from the previous course already has them if nobody deletes anything.
That closes this course, and with it the first four books: the platforms that bring you orders, your own channel, the system that runs the floor, and the rails the money travels on. If you want one action from the whole set, it is still the one from topic 1 — calculate your effective rate, then go and negotiate the only slice anyone can negotiate.