American Express Enhanced Authorization

American Express Enhanced Authorization

Reduce fraud and increase approval rates by sharing additional transaction data with American Express ®

 

 

Overview

 

Enhanced Authorization is a free solution from American Express that better identifies who is on the other end of transactions in real-time. Merchants who use Enhanced Authorization typically see increased approval rates, reduced false positives, and reductions in fraud, while maintaining a seamless customer experience.

 

Enhanced Authorization enables Merchants to share additional transaction data with American Express, such as email address, IP address, shipping information, phone numbers, and more. American Express uses its best-in-class machine learning models to link together thousands of factors including customer spending patterns, merchant profiles and real-time transaction data to significantly improve our ability to assess risk and distinguish between a legitimate customer and a fraudster.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Benefits

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Increase approval rates

 

Merchants typically see higher approval rates with Enhanced Authorization. Legitimate customers are more easily identified through the sharing of additional transaction information.

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Reduce false positives

 

A customer attempting a large purchase at a merchant for the first time might have been declined but may now be approved based on the additional data the merchant provides to American Express.

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Reduce fraud

 

Because Enhanced Authorization makes it easy to validate a customer, we can also accurately decline fraudulent purchase attempts.

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Seamless customer experience

 

Enhanced Authorization has no impact to the customer checkout experience (no step-up authentication). Merchants provide data elements in the background through the authorization request.

 

How It Works

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Capture & Send Data

 

Merchant captures customer data and sends it to American Express at the time of authorization

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Authorization Decision

 

American Express compares data against positive & negative usage across the network and other data sources, and incorporates the data into the authorization decision

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Improved Response

 

American Express provides a more accurate authorization result in real-time

 

 

Implementation

 

Merchants have two implementation options:

 

 

Option 1 (Recommended):

 

Authorization Request

 

Merchants populate optional data fields in the authorization request with data captured. American Express receives the data elements and uses them in real-time to provide a more accurate authorization response.

Option 2:

 

Enhanced Authorization API

 

Merchants capture data elements at the time of the transaction and sends an API message directly to American Express. When American Express receives the authorization request, it is combined with the data in the API message and used in real-time to provide a more accurate authorization response.

 

 

Enhanced Authorization API flowchart
Graphic of a Merchant Scenario and the Recommended Action

Click to access Enhanced Authorization API documentation on the American Express Developer Portal

 

For additional information after you have worked with your gateway / processor, please contact an American Express fraud representative: EnhancedAuth@aexp.com

 

All products and services may not be available to all merchants

Additional Resources