Visa's VAMP ratio is fraud reports plus disputes divided by settled transactions. A merchant is Excessive at a 1.5 percent ratio with at least 1,500 fraud reports and disputes in a month, and the fine is 10 dollars per dispute.
One ratio replaces two programs
In April 2025 Visa consolidated its fraud monitoring program and its dispute monitoring program into a single framework, the Visa Acquirer Monitoring Program, or VAMP. The old world had two ratios to watch, a fraud rate and a dispute rate, each with its own threshold. The new world has one: the VAMP ratio, which is the count of fraud reports, known as TC40s, plus disputes, known as TC15s, divided by the count of settled transactions in the month.
The consolidation matters because fraud reports now count alongside chargebacks. A merchant who kept chargebacks low but ignored fraud reports used to stay under the radar. Under VAMP, both feed the same number, and a store with a fraud problem and a small chargeback problem can cross the threshold on the fraud side alone. The ratio is calculated monthly from the previous calendar month's VisaNet data, and it covers card-not-present transactions only.
Related reading on this site: Home and Friendly Fraud: The Chargeback Where the Customer Is the Fraudster cover the neighbouring problems in more depth.
The thresholds that bite
For merchants in the US, Canada, Europe, and Asia Pacific, the Excessive level is a VAMP ratio of 1.5 percent with at least 1,500 fraud reports and disputes in the month, effective April 1, 2026. Before that date the ratio was 2.2 percent. At the Excessive level Visa applies a 10 dollar fine per dispute, and the merchant faces a remediation plan and, in the worst case, losing the ability to take Visa at all.
The count floor matters as much as the ratio. A small store with 200 transactions a month and 5 disputes has a 2.5 percent ratio but only 5 events, far below the 1,500 floor, so it is not Excessive. The floor is what protects small merchants. The danger is for the mid-size store that grows past 1,500 disputes a month without noticing, because the ratio that was harmless at 500 events becomes a fine at 1,500.
What keeps the ratio down
The fastest lever is pre-dispute resolution. Disputes resolved through Visa Rapid Dispute Resolution, and fraud reports that qualify under Compelling Evidence 3.0, are excluded from the ratio. A merchant who enrolls in RDR and submits compelling evidence, the delivery confirmation, the device fingerprint, the prior undisputed transactions, keeps those cases out of the count entirely.
The second lever is the fraud side. Most fraud reports come from a small number of causes: account takeovers, card testing, and friendly fraud from first-party misuse. Fix the cause and the ratio falls. Card testing, where a bot runs thousands of small authorizations to find a live card, also has its own enumeration threshold: a 20 percent enumeration ratio with at least 300,000 enumerated transactions. A store that sees a burst of small declined authorizations should treat it as a VAMP problem, not a nuisance.
Frequently asked questions
What is the Visa VAMP ratio?
Fraud reports (TC40) plus disputes (TC15), divided by settled transactions in the month. It replaced Visa's separate fraud and dispute ratios in April 2025.
What VAMP ratio makes a merchant Excessive?
A 1.5 percent ratio with at least 1,500 fraud reports and disputes in a month, for merchants in the US, Canada, Europe, and Asia Pacific, effective April 1, 2026. The fine is 10 dollars per dispute.
Do fraud reports count toward VAMP?
Yes. Fraud reports and disputes feed the same ratio, so a store with a fraud problem can cross the threshold even with low chargebacks.
How do I keep disputes out of my VAMP ratio?
Use Visa Rapid Dispute Resolution and submit Compelling Evidence 3.0 where it applies. Cases resolved through RDR and qualifying compelling evidence are excluded from the ratio.