What is the Terminated Merchant File?
You may not have ever believed it to be true, but there is such a thing as a merchant account blacklist – it’s actually known as the MATCH list or “Terminated Merchant File,” (TMF for short). Merchants are placed on this list because they were found to have violated their credit card processing agreement at some time. Due this breach, these merchants had been terminated from being allowed to have a merchant account.
This master list is used as a screening tool by other credit card processing companies to see whether or not a business is suitable for a merchant account. Being on this list raises a red flag to merchant processing companies that this company applying for the account may be a high risk.
Businesses may have been terminated and put on the list for the following reasons:
- Fraud
- Merchant collusion
- Laundering
- Excessive chargebacks
- And more
It is not impossible to get a merchant account if you’re on the MATCH list. Please contact us at 1-800-930-4476 and we can find out if you’re eligible for a merchant account.