How the Excessive Chargeback Programme works
The programme runs under this name in Mastercard's Security Rules and Procedures, Merchant Edition, of 4 August 2026 (section 8.3). Mastercard measures each merchant, identified by the merchant ID its acquirer assigned, every calendar month.
The measure is basis points: the chargebacks the acquirer received for the merchant in a month, divided by the merchant's Mastercard transactions in the preceding month, multiplied by 10,000. A merchant over the thresholds is an ECM, or an HECM at the higher level.
The thresholds and the assessments are not printed in the public manual. It refers to the Excessive Chargeback Merchant edit in the Acquirer Chargeback Monitoring Program chapter of Mastercard's Data Integrity Monitoring Program manual, which Mastercard provides to its customers.
What happens to a merchant in the programme
Mastercard may assess the acquirer of an ECM or HECM, and pays issuers recovery fees out of what it collects. Acquirers pass the cost to the merchant under their contracts.
After a merchant has been an ECM or HECM for six months, consecutive or not, Mastercard may advise the acquirer on an action plan or require a risk review of the acquirer at its own expense. Excessive chargebacks are also one of the reasons for which an acquirer that ends a merchant's contract lists the merchant in MATCH.
Who needs to watch the programme
Any merchant taking Mastercard, and above all its acquirer or payment facilitator, since the assessment lands there first. The count is of chargebacks received, so winning a case later does not lower it. Fewer disputes do: fraud screening, clear billing and refunds made before the issuer files.
Excessive Chargeback Programme, EFM or VAMP?
- Excessive Fraud Merchant Programme
- Mastercard's companion programme, concerned with fraud on a merchant's transactions and not with chargebacks of every kind.
- VAMP
- The Visa Acquirer Monitoring Program, Visa's counterpart, with its own way of counting and its own thresholds.
Where Mastercard's Excessive Chargeback Programme shows up in a platform
Modules that do the work
- Card acquiringCard acceptance on the phone, in store and online, through the acquirer you choose.
- Fraud & riskReal-time fraud scoring, limits and case management, with the risk engines you already trust.
- Analytics & monitoringProduct analytics, attribution, engagement and crash reports, on a tracking plan you control.
- Merchant onboardingBusiness sign-up, verification and underwriting, from application to first payment.
Platforms that need it
Guides that go deeper
Where it is written
The laws and standards this page's facts come from.
General information, not legal advice: what applies to you depends on your services and your market.