What Happens When A Passenger Disputes A Payment?

If one of your passengers has recently disputed a payment, it's normal for everyone to have a few questions, especially the passenger is anxious to get the funds associated with the disputed payment back. This article will explain what the dispute process looks like and give you some pointers to share with your passenger about what to do next if they still want to go on the trip. 

Where's The Money Now? Check out this graph for a detailed, behind-the-scenes look at exactly what happens when a payment becomes flagged as a disputed charge: 

Stripe is the online software that processes payments on GroupCollect, your payment platform. They are a world-class financial organization and innovators in the online payment processing space. 

Additionally, as you can see from the graph above, there are also only one of four parties involved in this payment dispute: 

1. You
2. Your passenger
3. Tour operator payment platform (GroupCollect)
4. Stripe
5. Your passenger's bank

The big takeaway here is that disputes are complex, and your passenger's bank will be the party that decides the outcome of the dispute and how long the process will take. In some cases, banks can take up to 90 days or more to review disputes and make a decision on where the money will go next. 

My Passenger Still Wants To Go On The Trip, Now What?

Check out this video. It will inform you about everything you need to know and what you can do about this dispute: 

What you should know:

The disputed payment has been removed from our account

We no longer have the money associated with the passenger’s disputed payment. In fact, the passenger’s account should currently show that they owe the disputed amount as well as a $15 fee for initiating the dispute. 

Currently, we’re not contesting disputes: 

Normally, when a passenger disputes a payment, their financial institution takes over to investigate. Those investigations can take a while so, in the interest of time, we won’t be contesting payment disputes. Instead, we’ll have the money taken out of our account and returned to the passenger’s financial institution right away. The financial institution will then determine what happens with the money from there as each one operates a little differently. 

Share this information with your passenger

We want to remain transparent and consistent when sharing information with passengers which is why we’re sharing all this with you: so we’re all on the same page. 

What you can do:

Help this passenger resolve their dispute quickly

Most disputes are initiated by accident. If that's the case, encourage the passenger to reach out to their financial institution and cancel the dispute. Then, please encourage them to add a new source of payment to continue paying for their trip in a timely manner.

Make sure they've seen the passenger payment dispute video

Any passenger who initiates a dispute will receive a link to this video. It explains what's going on and how they can proceed if they still want to go on the trip. Share the link with your passenger in case they haven't seen it.

If the passenger has additional questions, have them reach out to us at Help@Groupcollect.com and we’ll be able to give more details. Either way, we hope to have this situation resolved and your passenger can resume making payments as soon as possible. Take care!