BitPay disputes now resolve in 36 hours on average across all eligible categories. The improvement comes from three changes: automated merchant outreach (the system contacts the merchant with the dispute evidence and a 48-hour response window), direct card-network integration (we no longer batch-process disputes through the legacy queue), and one-click dispute opening from the history feed.
Eligible disputes are auto-routed: a charge from a vendor flagged for fraud is auto-disputed, with the customer notified. Non-fraud disputes (e.g. service not received, charged twice) follow the standard workflow but with a hard 48-hour merchant response window. If the merchant does not respond in 48 hours, the dispute escalates to the card network for resolution.
Customers open disputes from the history feed with one click. The dispute timeline shows the merchant response, the card-network status, and the final outcome in real time. Most disputes (about 60%) resolve without manual intervention - the merchant refunds once they see the evidence.
For the 11-day average we replaced, the workflow required a human to submit the dispute to the card network, then wait for the merchant to respond, then wait for the network to arbitrate. The new workflow automates the first two steps and parallelizes the third. Operators who track dispute-related balances no longer see weeks-long pending states.
