Disputes

Disputes occur when a customer contests the charges you collect from their card issuer. Disputes can include chargebacks, inquiries, or retrievals, as well as other items, depending on the payment gateway you use. In WHMCS, you can update evidence and submit and close disputes.

You can access this feature at Billing > Disputes.

WHMCS 8.3 added support for disputes for Stripe (credit card only) and PayPal® Checkout transactions.

The Dispute Process

Each card issuer or payment gateway handles disputes differently. For most card issuers and payment gateways, however, disputes follow the same general process:

1. The customer submits the dispute to the card issuer or payment gateway.
2. The card issuer or payment gateway notifies you of the dispute.
3. In some scenarios, the card issuer or payment gateway will place a hold on the related funds.
4. You can choose to provide evidence of the charge's validity, accept the dispute, or refund the payment.

Depending on the card issuer or payment gateway, some disputes may incur a fee.

Dispute-Related Permissions

To work with disputes, admins must have the appropriate permissions, which the Full Administrator role includes by default:

• List Disputes — View the list of disputes.
• Manage Disputes — Submit evidence for, view evidence for, and manage the dispute.
• Close Disputes — Close disputes immediately.

Responding to Disputes

WHMCS 8.3 added support for disputes for Stripe and PayPal® Checkout transactions. WHMCS 8.9 and later also include dispute support for PayPal Payments and PayPal Card Payments.

To view details for a dispute, click on the view icon in the far-right column for that dispute. The displayed details for a dispute vary based on the payment gateway. They often include the dispute reason, dispute and transaction IDs, status, submitted evidence, and information about the customer and the actions taken during the dispute process.

Submitting Disputes
Each payment gateway handles submitting evidence and disputes differently. Submitting a dispute is final.

Stripe Disputes

WHMCS only supports disputes for the Stripe module. The Stripe ACH and Stripe SEPA modules do not support disputes.

The Stripe integration provides full features for managing disputes. Among other features, Stripe allows you to submit evidence directly through the WHMCS interface. Currently, other payment gateways do not support direct submission from within WHMCS. Before you submit a dispute, make certain that all of the displayed information is correct and that you have submitted all of your relevant evidence.

To submit evidence for a dispute:

1. Under Submit Evidence, choose one or more types of evidence from the Choose Evidence to Submit menu. Additional form fields will appear.
2. Enter the evidence or upload files for each of the evidence types you selected.
3. Click Update Evidence.

When you have finished adding evidence and are ready to submit your response to the dispute, click Submit Dispute.

PayPal Disputes

PayPal Checkout, PayPal Payments, and PayPal Card Payments do not allow you to submit evidence directly from within WHMCS. Instead, to submit evidence or submit the dispute, click Manage Dispute. WHMCS will direct you to PayPal, which will guide you through the evidence and submission process.

Closing a Dispute

When you close a dispute, it is immediately accepted and lost. This action is final.

When you do this, WHMCS will immediately relay this to the payment gateway, which will submit a full refund to the customer. WHMCS does not issue the refund itself. If you use a payment gateway that supports payment reversals, WHMCS must wait until your payment gateway notifies WHMCS, after which WHMCS will automatically return the payment.

Payment Reversals
Whether WHMCS can reverse the payment depends on whether the payment gateway supports payment reversals and your current settings. Currently, PayPal supports payment reversals but Stripe does not.

To close a dispute, click Close Dispute at the bottom of the page.