The challenge

An online marketplace that consumers use to book short-term homestays and experiences faced constant risk of payment fraud. Fraudsters repeatedly tried to steal money via reservations booked through the company’s platform, either by using fake credit cards, creating a fake accommodation listings, or assuming fake identities.

The company had algorithms and automated solutions in place to address these risks, including AI and machine learning models, but they couldn’t keep up with fraudsters, who continually grew more savvy.

The client and its customers only realized fraud had taken place after the fact, when customers had to dispute fraudulent charges on their credit cards. The fraud was costing the company millions of dollars annually in chargebacks and related fees.

Our solution

TTEC identified and implemented a series of proactive solutions. Using those solutions, we quickly discovered additional fraud that the client’s existing solutions had missed.

We set up a team of back-office associates who worked as fraud investigators. These people brought the benefit of human judgment to the process. Now, whenever the machine learning model identified potentially suspicious accounts or transactions, they were sent to our fraud investigators who take additional action as needed. These trust and safety specialists authenticate accounts and information when they can and escalate the matter when they can’t.

We also made other back-office improvements, including streamlining processes that improved customer experience. We removed ineffective multifactor authentication where it wasn’t needed, for instance, and implemented other changes to make the customer journey smoother.

The results

The client now has 350 full-time equivalent TTEC fraud investigators in India who investigate fraud, about a third of whom work from home. That team has recovered more than 40,000 ATO (accounts taken over) that hadn’t been detected by the company’s machine learning model. Our associates have earned a 95% quality score, surpassing a client benchmark of 70%.

The company has saved $16 million from implementing our suggestions throughout our six-year partnership so far. The client continues to review additional suggestions we’ve made; if those are implemented, the savings could more than double.

Perhaps more important than any one performance metric is this: Associates are convinced they hold the power to achieve positive outcomes because the value of customer surveys and NPS scores was demonstrated in compelling fashion through training.