Mail Order/Telephone Order
What is Mail Order/Telephone Order?
Mail Order/Telephone Order (MOTO) is a payment accepted when the cardholder gives their card details to the merchant by phone, mail, or fax, and the merchant keys those details into a payment system on the cardholder's behalf. No terminal reads the card and the cardholder never enters the details themselves, so MOTO is processed as a .
MOTO predates and still covers catalog orders, travel and hospitality bookings taken by phone, donations handled by a call center, and B2B orders placed through an account manager. Most merchants now key these into a virtual terminal (a browser form inside a processor or PSP dashboard) instead of paper vouchers, though the underlying exposure hasn't changed: nothing confirms that the person reading out the card number is the legitimate cardholder.
Key facts
- Also known as: MO/TO, mail order telephone order, phone order payment
- Transaction type:
- Initiated by: the merchant, acting on instructions from the cardholder
- Authentication: can't be applied, since there's no browser session to challenge, so no is available
- Typical users: catalog retailers, travel and hospitality, call centers, charities, B2B sellers invoicing by phone
- Identified by: a MOTO indicator in the authorization message, which tells the the transaction was keyed in by the merchant
How MOTO transactions work
- Order placed. The cardholder calls, mails, or faxes an order and supplies the card number, expiry date, card security code, and billing address.
- Details captured. An agent enters them into a virtual terminal or an internal order system wired to the .
- Flagged as MOTO. The transaction is submitted with a MOTO indicator, so the issuer sees that the card was absent and no cardholder authentication took place.
- Authorization decision. The issuer approves or declines the . and the card security code are the main verification signals available, since there's no device, browser, or authentication data to score.
- Capture and settlement. The merchant captures the approved amount, and funds settle through the on the normal cycle.
Why it matters
- It keeps a sales channel open that checkout can't cover. Phone ordering serves cardholders without reliable internet access, complex configured orders that need an agent, and markets where catalog retail is still active.
- It rescues orders that fail online. A support agent can complete a purchase over the phone when a cardholder's checkout attempt breaks, rather than losing the sale.
- In the EEA, MOTO sits outside PSD2 . SCA applies to electronically initiated payments, and a payment read out over the phone or written on a form isn't one.
- Fraud liability stays with the merchant. With no authentication step in the flow, a MOTO payment can't carry a 3DS liability shift, so a fraud lands on the merchant's account.
Common issues with MOTO payments
- Fraud and . A stolen card number and billing address are enough to complete a MOTO order, and the merchant has no authentication record to submit as dispute evidence afterwards.
- PCI scope. Card details spoken aloud pull the call center, its phone system, and any call recordings into scope. Sensitive authentication data such as the card security code can't be retained after authorization, so recordings that capture it require pause-and-resume or equivalent controls.
- Keying errors. Manually entered digits generate declines and AVS mismatches that a tapped or tokenized card wouldn't produce.
- Higher processing cost. Schemes price card-not-present above card-present interchange, because the issuer carries more risk when no authentication data accompanies the authorization.
