Skip to main content
This is the field dictionary behind Chargeback & Dispute FAQ — use that page for how the process works and what to do, and this page when you are staring at a value in the Portal, in a CSV or in a settlement line and need to know what it means. Evidence selection is on Chargeback evidence guide.

​
My settlement detail has a CHARGEBACK row. What are the Event Types and which way does the money go?

For chargeback movements Transaction Type is always CHARGEBACK. The Event Type column is what tells you whether the line is a debit or a repayment, and whether it carries the amount, the fee, or both: Reading the pattern rather than the amounts is the reliable way round: *_PRE_DEDUCT always takes money, *_AMOUNT_REFUND always gives it back, and the fee only ever appears on a PRE_DEDUCT line. A case that opens, escalates and is finally won therefore produces three or four separate CHARGEBACK rows across different settlement dates — not one net row. Which case statuses produce which event: Note the consequence for CASE_LOST: there is no separate “loss” event. You were already debited when the case opened, so losing produces no new line — the absence of an AMOUNT_REFUND row is the loss. Timing and the settlement-day rule are in Chargeback & Dispute FAQ. Older records can carry an empty Event Type. Those predate this breakdown and are always debits.

​
What is Compulsory Channel Review on the chargeback detail page?

compulsoryChannelReview is a true/false flag on the case, returned to the Portal, that records whether the payment side mandates its own review of the case. Chargebacks are created with it set to true; customer disputes raised through an in-app complaint flow are created with it set to false. Read it as an expectation-setter for the outcome: where it is true, the case is decided by the reviewing side and your submission is input to that review, not a resolution of it. Where it is false, resolving the case with the customer directly is a real option, and closing the dispute is how that resolution is recorded. What actually gates the Close action is the case status, not this flag: closing is available from EVIDENCE_REQUIRED, ACTION_REQUIRED and UNDER_REVIEW, and an ESCALATED case cannot be closed. So if Close is greyed out, check the status first.

​
What does each event in a Customer Dispute timeline mean?

The timeline records 11 event values. Anything not in this list is not a timeline event.

​
What does each event in a Chargeback timeline mean?

14 event values, a different set from customer disputes: AUTO_SUBMITS_EVIDENCE and CREATE_SECOND_CYCLE_DISPUTE are the two events that can appear without any action from you. If you have set a blanket handling strategy, these are where you find out it fired.

​
Which timeline events increase the unread counter?

Exactly three, and all three are inbound messages rather than status changes:
  • USER_RESPONSE
  • PLATFORM_RESPONSE
  • USER_CREATE_COMPLAINT
Your own MERCHANT_RESPONSE does not increment it, and neither does any status change, any evidence submission or any deadline event. So an unread count is always someone said something to you, never something happened to the case — a case can move all the way to a final status without the counter ever moving. Do not use the counter as an activity indicator; use the timeline.

​
How do I export my chargeback detail, and does it go through the Reports tab?

The Chargebacks list has its own export, and unlike most Portal exports it is a direct synchronous download: the file is streamed to your browser when you click, and no task row appears in any Reports tab. If you are looking for it in Exports & report downloads, it is not there — that page covers the queued exports, this one is not queued. The file name is:
Both dates are YYYYMMDD in UTC+8 and come from the created-time filter you had applied. The export follows your current list filters, so filter first, export second.

​
What are the columns in the chargeback CSV export?

26 columns, in this order: Every header is unique, so a parser keyed on header text is safe. Note that the export says Chargeback where the Portal detail page says Dispute for the same values — columns 12 and 25 are the disputed amount and the fee respectively, not two amounts.

​
Column 21 says the case is not settled yet. Has the money been taken or not?

That is exactly what Settlement Status is for, and it is the column to check when the case status and your bank balance disagree. Chargeback Status and Settlement Status answer different questions and move at different times: A chargeback is booked against you when the case opens, but it only reaches a settlement statement once the original payment order has settled, because it reuses that order’s settlement exchange rate. So a case can sit at ACTION_REQUIRED with the amount already booked and Settlement Status still showing unsettled — the debit is coming, on the settlement day of the original order or the next settlement day after that. Pair this column with the Event Type table above to reconcile a specific CHARGEBACK line.

​
Why is Dispute Amount different from what the cardholder disputed?

Because they are two different figures, and the Portal shows you yours. The amount raised on the payment side is denominated in the payment currency of the original transaction. The Dispute Amount you see — and the amount you are actually debited — is the merchant share, expressed in the order currency:
  1. Any buyer-side fee on the original payment is funded by Waffo, not by you, and is excluded from your disputable balance.
  2. Your share of the disputed amount is taken in proportion to your share of what the buyer paid, and any remainder is borne by Waffo.
  3. That share is converted to the order currency and rounded down (FLOOR) to 2 decimal places, so the figure is never rounded up against you. A sub-cent remainder stays with Waffo.
Consequences worth knowing:
  • On a cross-currency order, your Dispute Amount will not equal the figure quoted on the payment side, and the difference is not an error.
  • Where the order was already partly or fully refunded, your remaining disputable balance is lower, and your share is capped by it.
  • Your Dispute Amount can never exceed the order amount.
The proportional split itself — how much of a given dispute falls to you versus to Waffo — is a funding rule, not a self-service setting; ask support if a specific case does not reconcile.

​
What currency is my chargeback fee in? It is not USD.

The chargeback fee currency comes from your merchant configuration, not from a global default, and it is returned on the case as feeCurrency alongside feeAmount. It is not guaranteed to match your settlement currency and it is not guaranteed to be USD. When the fee currency differs from your settlement currency, the fee is converted to the settlement currency at settlement time, using the settlement-side rate for that settlement — the same rate basis as the rest of that settlement, not a rate captured on the day the case opened. Where the two currencies are the same, no conversion happens. So if your statement shows a chargeback fee in a currency you did not expect, that is your configured fee currency showing through. The fee amount itself is a contract term — see Chargeback & Dispute FAQ.

​
How do I find the cases that are about to run out of time?

Both the Chargebacks and Customer Disputes lists carry an expiring soon filter, which returns the open cases whose evidence deadline falls within the next 3 days. That is the supported way to triage by deadline; each case still carries its own expiryDateTime, and that value is authoritative for the individual case.

​
What happens when the evidence deadline passes?

The two case types behave differently, and this is the most commonly misread difference between them: So an expired customer dispute is a nudge, not a closed door: submit late material and keep working the case. An expired chargeback is a loss. When you are prioritising a queue under time pressure, chargeback deadlines are the hard ones. Each case’s window is set on the payment side and arrives on the case as expiryDateTime — there is no single Waffo-wide window, and it is not derived from the transaction date, so always read it per case rather than computing it.

​
What do the Alert Status values in the daily dispute report mean?

If Chargeback Alert is enabled for you, the daily dispute report carries an alerts attachment. Alert Status is the overall stage of the alert case: MANUAL PROCESSING does not mean “manual processing by you”. It is the single most misread value in this report: it means Waffo took the case out of the automated path. You are contacted directly if anything is actually needed from you. The attachment reports the alert case’s stage and its refund; it does not expose the internal handling steps behind a MANUAL PROCESSING case, so there is nothing further to read into that value than “not automated, being handled”.

​
What is Refund Status, and what does an Alert ID look like?

Refund Status in the same attachment tracks only the refund that the alert triggered: A FAILED refund does not mean the alert was ignored — it is exactly the case that gets picked up by hand, which is why MANUAL PROCESSING and a FAILED refund often appear on the same row. Alert IDs are formatted like CBA-00-20251125-00003: a fixed CBA prefix, a two-digit segment, the date, and a sequence number. Quote the whole string when you contact support about a specific alert. Where an alert relates to a subscription, the attachment also carries the subscription id. Once the alert has refunded an order, your own refund request for that order is rejected with A0039 — see Chargeback & Dispute FAQ for what that means and how alert fees are billed.