Card declines are quietly bleeding issuers. False declines alone cost the industry US$213 billion globally in 2025, climbing to US$297 billion by 2029. Cardholders don’t always call. Many reach for the next card, and that one becomes top-of-wallet. Today, 78% of FIs say failed payments critically hurt customer experience, and a third have lost 2% to 5% of customers.
Datos Insights introduces the Smart Approval Advantage: a shift from blanket decline rules to flexible, cardholder-level decisioning. Issuers weigh customer history, merchant trust, and recurring payment patterns rather than apply one threshold to all. A long-time customer paying Netflix shouldn’t be treated as a first charge at an unknown merchant. Rules should move in hours, not months.
The report shows issuers how to audit decline portfolios, fix recurring-payment failures, apply cardholder rules to premium segments, and engage fraud and compliance early. The payoff: recovered interchange, stronger top-of-wallet status, and retained commercial relationships.
Card issuer executives, heads of payments, fraud and authorization decisioning leaders, and product owners responsible for cardholder experience at retail banks, commercial banks, and card processors should read this report.
It is based on Datos Insights interviews with card-issuing FIs and card processors across North America, Latin America, and Europe in the second half of 2025, validated through two in-person roundtable sessions.
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