Changes to the Address Verification Service
The Address Verification Service (AVS) is a risk reduction tool that allows merchants to verify a cardholder’s address during authorization or when storing their credentials on file. All merchants whose acquirers subscribe to AVS may request postal code and street address verification for a cardholder. Participating issuers verify the address and provide the AVS match result in authorization or account verification responses.
To streamline AVS processing, Visa will simplify AVS result codes by discontinuing redundant values. The remaining AVS result codes will clearly indicate whether address verification was performed and, if performed, the verification result.
Acquirer Impact
Acquirers that send AVS data must be aware that V.I.P. will no longer support certain existing address verification result codes in the response message.
What this means for merchants
Merchants should work with their acquirer or processing partners to ensure the Visa AVS updates are applied. Certain existing address verification result codes will no longer be supported.
Merchant processes in place to accept or reject transactions based on AVS results may need to be modified.
