Luxury Jeweler James Allen Fights Fraud While Keeping Customers Happy

James Allen provides luxury jewelry shopping for online consumers. That includes ensuring a seamless customer experience — which means frictionless fraud prevention.

The Problem
Diamonds are a fraudster’s best friend: these valuable, easily resold items have evergreen appeal, never going out of fashion. They’re perfect for an online criminal with an eye on their personal bottom line.

James Allen was fully aware of this risk and equally aware of what it could cost. High-value goods mean that each successful fraudulent transaction represents a significant loss. The online jewelry retailer assembled a highly skilled team of fraud analysts to guard against cybercriminals.

While the fraud team was extremely successful at blocking fraud, they were also turning away good business and causing customer friction at checkout. Tight fraud rules meant lower approval rates and lost sales, and took the shine off the customer experience.

James Allen believes friction isn't appropriate for the customer experience associated with its luxury brand. It wanted to eliminate both phone calls to customers to validate their identity and requests that customers provide further identifying information.

James Allen needed to leverage the high-tech possibilities of modern fraud prevention without affecting its legitimate customers. 

The Solution
James Allen started using Forter’s Decision as a Service technology, which uses machine learning continually refined by human expertise to get instant approve/decline decisions for every transaction. The team used these real-time decisions as a superlative fraud detection tool, and were delighted with the accuracy and high approval rates the system provided.

Additionally, Forter’s ability to evaluate transactions from anywhere in the world on both a global and local level complemented the international profile of James Allen’s business.

James Allen was happy to keep relying on its excellent fraud team and its ability to keep chargebacks to a minimum, and therefore didn’t want to sign up for Forter’s 100 percent chargeback guarantee. What the retailer did want was the frictionless feel that Forter’s system brought to the purchase process — faster confirmations for customers; no concerns about backlog during busy periods; and no more buyers irritated by and even canceling orders because of demands for more identifying information.

“Forter surpasses our expectations," says Eileen Thomas, operations, logistics and risk management for James Allen. "It’s fraud prevention that equals growth, with higher approvals and seamless checkout.”

The Result
James Allen is delighted with the results from using Forter’s technology as a fraud detection tool. Friction is massively reduced, both internally and for its customers, while approvals, which were high to start with, have actually improved 1.5 percent, contributing directly to the company’s bottom line.

Leveraging Forter’s system has led to a huge improvement in efficiency and a reduction in stress internally, and made it far easier for James Allen to cope with holiday shopping spikes. Moreover, it means a far faster, more seamless purchasing experience for James Allen’s customers.

Even more crucial for James Allen is the fact that customers are no longer bothered by calls for extra information. The retailer's fraud team knows it can rely on the accuracy of Forter’s system, which pulls data from numerous sources and uses technology including behavioral analysis, cyber intelligence and elastic identity.

For James Allen, fraud prevention has now become scalable, and the customer experience at checkout matches and contributes to the high-quality shopping experience the brand provides.

“And best of all, we can process more orders with less effort during those busy holiday periods," Thomas notes.

Frictionless Fraud Prevention
James Allen’s challenge was to surpass the expectations of luxury buyers. This was no easy feat when it came to fraud prevention. The retailer's excellent fraud team couldn’t help introducing friction into checkout through time-consuming manual reviews and intrusive requests for further information.

Using Forter’s technology as a high-powered fraud detection tool has allowed James Allen to take its checkout experience to the same high standard as the rest of its website.

For James Allen, ideal customer experience is now the norm at every step of the purchase process. “The difference to our fraud team is felt every day," says Thomas. "Forter’s real-time decisions are a fantastic tool — they simply remove the stress from the review process.

“We hold ourselves to a very high standard when it comes to customer experience. Thanks to Forter, our checkout process is now as friction-free and seamless as the rest of the site. Instead of being frustrated by delays or requests for further information, our customers receive the true luxury experience.”

Bill Zielke is the chief marketing officer of Forter.