Ravelin

Service Overview

Ravelin is a UK fraud and payments technology company that frames its approach as AI and agentic. It does not acquire payments, extend credit or absorb chargeback losses. It sits above a merchant's transaction and account systems and outputs a judgement on each transaction, each account and each abusive action.

Its solution coverage is wider than typical payment risk: 7 areas, namely Online Payment Fraud, Refund Abuse, Promo Abuse, Account Security and ATO, 3D Secure, Marketplace Partner Fraud and Transaction Optimization, across 4 industries - retail, travel, ticketing and hospitality, digital goods and subscriptions, and marketplaces.

That combination takes a clear stance: card acquiring risk only answers whether a card transaction should pass, while a large share of real losses never surfaces as a chargeback at all. Refund abuse is money the merchant hands back voluntarily, promo abuse drains marketing budget, and seller fraud on a marketplace is absorbed by the platform. None of those appear in any card-network report, yet all of them sit in the financial statements.

A distinctive asset is the standalone 3DS and SCA regulation map, giving reference 3DS success rates by country. The perspective is practical: 3DS is mandatory in Europe, but mandatory does not mean challenging every transaction, since issuer support for exemptions varies widely and one strategy produces very different pass rates across markets. Treating 3DS as a conversion variable rather than a compliance switch is where European businesses most easily find upside.

Beyond that it publishes API and SDK documentation, fraud guides and industry reports, and offers Support and Investigations delivered by a human fraud team. For teams without dedicated fraud staff, that service often matters more than the model.

Key Strengths

• Both sides of a marketplace are covered: conventional risk tooling looks only at buyer payment, while marketplace exposure sits on both ends - buyers bring payment fraud and refund abuse, sellers bring fake storefronts, order gaming and disappearing after fulfilment. Seller and partner fraud is a separate area here, which is a genuine requirement for platform businesses.
• Non-payment abuse is the home turf: refund abuse and promo abuse never appear in chargeback reports and are scattered across after-sales cost and marketing budget with no clear owner. Bringing them into scope gives these silent losses visibility.
• 3DS is treated as an optimisation target: country-level success-rate references let strategy be configured per market. For multi-market European operations that can lower fraud and lift conversion at once, without choosing between universal challenge and universal exemption.
• Account security shares the layer with payment fraud: account takeover eventually surfaces as orders, so judging it alongside payment fraud closes the seam where the account side looks clean but the transaction side does not.
• A human investigation service backstops the model: many fraud judgements ultimately need a person to read evidence - shipping proof, support tickets, prior interactions. A support and investigations service means smaller merchants need not build that process from zero.
• Complete documentation and API surface: API and SDK docs are in place, and storefronts, apps and platform systems can all integrate without changing acquirer or gateway.

Product Ecosystem

Online Payment Fraud

The core module, making real-time decisions at checkout to lower both fraud rate and false declines rather than simply tightening thresholds.

Refund Abuse

Identifies patterns such as repeated refund requests on various grounds, empty-box returns and buy-and-swap. These losses are paid out voluntarily by the merchant with no chargeback process involved, which is why conventional risk tools miss them.

Promo Abuse

Identifies bulk coupon use, multi-account new-customer rewards and referral reward farming. These losses sit in marketing budget and are commonly mistaken for acquisition cost for a long time.

Account Security and ATO

Covers registration, login, password reset and account changes, identifying credential stuffing and account takeover, sharing the decision layer with payment fraud.

3D Secure and SCA

Treats 3DS challenge strategy as an optimisable variable, adjusted per country using the regulation map. The aim is raising exemption hit rates without amplifying fraud.

Marketplace Partner Fraud

Covers seller onboarding fraud, fake storefronts, order gaming and disappearance after fulfilment. This is the clearest difference from providers that only handle the buyer side.

Transaction Optimization

A conversion-facing module that recovers false declines, balancing the fraud-blocking dial.

Limitations

• Both error directions stay with you: approving fraud costs goods plus chargeback fees and card-network fines; declining a good customer costs conversion and lifetime value. Only the judgement is delivered, and both financial consequences remain on the merchant side - fundamentally different from a guaranteed provider.
• Data sharing and cross-border compliance cost: transaction, account, device and behaviour data is required. UK and EU business falls under GDPR, and exporting personal data from mainland China also implicates the Personal Information Protection Law and the applicable export rules, with compliance review usually outlasting integration.
• The 3DS map is a reference, not a commitment: country success rates come from public and aggregated data, while real outcomes depend on your acquirer, issuer mix and transaction structure. Use it as a strategy starting point, not a revenue forecast.
• The model depends on business structure and data volume: the industries it prioritises - marketplaces, travel, digital goods - have well-developed behaviour baselines, while narrow verticals and very low-volume merchants fall back toward generic rules.
• Investigation must be confirmed separately: support and investigations is a service line, and whether it is included, charged per case or bundled by volume has to be settled up front. Otherwise the model produces judgements and the merchant still funds the investigation.
• No coverage of regulated obligations: AML transaction monitoring, onboarding review and sanctions screening are out of scope, so licensed institutions still need a separate system.

Use Cases

• Marketplaces and two-sided platforms (★★★★★): buyer-side payment fraud and seller-side partner fraud exist simultaneously, and covering both ends is where it is strongest.
• Travel, ticketing and hospitality (★★★★☆): high tickets, long fulfilment windows and frequent refund disputes make the combination of refund abuse and payment fraud a direct match for industry loss patterns.
• Digital goods and subscriptions (★★★★☆): no logistics and permissive refund policies make refund abuse the main leak, and the investigation service fills the evidence gap.
• Multi-market European retail (★★★★☆): under mandatory 3DS and SCA, country-level optimisation improves fraud and conversion together.
• Mainland China operations (★★☆☆☆): usable when a mainland entity runs cross-border business, but any export of personal data from the mainland must follow the Personal Information Protection Law and the applicable export rules, so a compliance assessment comes first. Purely domestic business does not need overseas risk tooling of this kind and has domestic equivalents without an export step.
• Small merchants with card-only, accountless checkout (★☆☆☆☆): least suitable. Its strength is accounts and non-payment abuse, so in a pure checkout scenario most modules go unused and a lighter payment risk tool is better value.
• Institutions requiring AML and licensing compliance (☆☆☆☆☆): least suitable. No AML transaction monitoring or watchlist screening, so regulatory requirements cannot be met.

Pricing

Main cost drivers are transaction volume, account scale, how many modules are enabled, whether human investigation is included, industry and dispute levels, and the integration approach. Ravelin does not publish standard pricing; headings and final rates follow the current official quote and contract.

FAQ

• What is the biggest difference from ordinary payment risk tooling?
  Coverage. Ordinary tools only answer whether a card should pass, while Ravelin also judges refund abuse, promo abuse and marketplace partner fraud - losses that never appear as chargebacks. If your losses are mostly card fraud the difference is small; if refund and promo abuse are a large share, it is large.

• Can the 3DS regulation map be used directly as a decision input?
  It works as a starting point, not a conclusion. The map gives country-level success-rate references, while actual outcomes depend on your acquirer, issuer distribution and transaction mix. The right use is drafting an initial exemption policy from the map, then back-testing per country on your own data and adjusting.

• We run a marketplace. How is the seller side handled?
  Marketplace partner fraud is a separate module covering fake storefronts, onboarding fraud, order gaming and disappearing after fulfilment. In deployment, seller onboarding review, settlement timing and risk decisions have to be connected - the risk decision must be able to influence payout timing, otherwise blocking happens after the money is gone.

• Is investigation an extra charge?
  It is a separate service line and inclusion has to be negotiated. Support and investigations takes on the actual investigation work, which is valuable for merchants without dedicated fraud staff. Write the scope, case volume and response times into the contract, or the model produces judgements nobody executes.

• Can a mainland China company use it?
  Cross-border business can be evaluated; purely domestic business does not need it. Transferring personal information abroad from the mainland must follow the Personal Information Protection Law and the applicable export rules, so confirm the applicable compliance path first. Domestic business is simpler with a domestic provider, with no export step at all.

Source: original 16IDC content. Product capabilities, supported countries and fee definitions follow the official documentation and your contract.