Cross-border payment solutions: acquiring, routing, compliance

Cross-border declines US cards: causes, fixes, and routing that actually works

flowchart: US card → EU acquirer (cross-border, X) vs US acquirer (domestic, ✓); AVS ZIP, retry logic, Pay by Bank (Plaid/ACH).

A European online project gets a rush of US buyers… and approvals sag, i.e. cross-border declines US cards: causes, fixes, and routing that actually works. That’s the classic cross-border decline pattern: the issuer sees “US cardholder → non-US merchant/acquirer,” becomes stricter, and says no. The cure isn’t one trick—it’s better data, smarter retry logic US issuers, and (when warranted) local routes or US-native rails.

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US domestic acquiring for EU merchant: how to fix US declines, choose solutions, and route like a local

US domestic acquiring for EU merchant: Checklist of requirements for accepting payments in the US, showing company and banking prerequisites (US entity, EIN, officer with SSN, bank account) and site policies (merchant location, support contacts, refund terms, clear descriptor)

TL;DR. If a European merchant pushes a lot of US-issued cards through an EU acquirer, the traffic looks cross-border to the issuer and approval rates drop. Local US acquiring and US-native rails (ACH, RTP, FedNow) usually lift conversions and cut costs. Visa also expects correct merchant location data in the auth/clearing stream and on site, which is easier when you process domestically. Rule of thumb: when 70–80%+ of your payers are US, US domestic becomes a near must-have. You need to think about US domestic acquiring for EU merchant.

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