CHICAGO - Yesterday, BP Products North America Inc. launched FraudGuard, its newly enhanced payment card fraud prevention program that features proven technology options for eligible sites and business incentives for participating retailers. Starting today, eligible BP branded marketers may opt-in to take advantage of different opportunities to increase payment card security at purchase points both indoors and outdoors.

According to a recent study, U.S. retail merchants incurred more than $139 billion in fraud losses in 2010. Moreover, nearly one-third of consumers worldwide have experienced credit or debit card fraud in the past five years. FraudGuard aims to protect BP??s marketers?? businesses as well as the consumers who visit their sites.

"Like many industries, we??re definitely seeing the impact of fraud and related charge backs at our U.S. retail sites," said Joe Fumo, card operations manager, in a press release. "FraudGuard empowers our network to take action to help prevent fraudulent activities at BP stations and provide a more secure site experience for their patrons."

Eligible BP marketers have the power to opt-in to one or both of the available fraud prevention tools. Within early implementations of the VADB and AVS capabilities, some participating BP sites have seen as much as an 85 percent decrease in charge backs.

Jennifer Brock of Corrigan Oil Company is an advocate of both opt-in technologies. "In the fight against fraud protection, AVS has helped to shield our dealers and ourselves from the ill-fated attempts of a few choice individuals. By adding dial back-up features to the line-up, BP is giving dealers more options and a better sense of security when it comes to protecting their locations," she said.

Jay Tan of Carroll Independent Fuel Company has seen first-hand how tighter security measures have helped impact his customers?? site experience. "Providing our sites with added securities have allowed our dealers to concentrate more on a positive buying experience for their consumers and shielded them from substantial charge backs," he said.