Mastercard's ABU (Automatic Billing Updater) and Visa's VAU (Visa Account Updater) are proprietary backend services that securely and automatically update a cardholder’s stored payment information (like new card numbers or expiration dates) with participating merchants and subscription services. These programs run seamlessly behind the scenes to reduce payment declines and prevent accidental service interruptions for recurring billing and "card-on-file" transactions.

How they work

• Card issuance: When you issue a replacement or renewed card, they securely transmit the new Primary Account Number (PAN) and expiration date to Mastercard or Visa.
• Merchant Inquiries: Merchants and payment gateways regularly query the ABU or VAU databases to check if a customer’s stored card information has changed.
• Automatic updates: If a match is found, the merchant’s billing files are updated automatically so a cardholder's subscriptions (e.g., streaming services, gym memberships) can continue without you needing to manually update the card.

Getting started

To enable ABU or VAU for a program, create a Service Desk ticket with request type = Settings/Configuration.

Mastercard's ABU

For a Mastercard card, you have the option to enable their Automatic Billing Updater (ABU) feature. When account credentials change, it’s challenging for consumers to inform all of their merchants. As a result, their card-not-present payments may be declined. This creates service disruptions for consumers, as well as lost revenue and decreased customer loyalty for merchants.

When a card is created, reissued, or a card's account credentials change, such as the card being lost, stolen, or closed, Pismo automatically notifies Mastercard if this feature is enabled. Mastercard, in turn, notifies the merchants it has on file for that card. Update notifications are sent to Mastercard on a daily basis.

For more information, refer to Mastercard's Automatic Billing Updater documentation.

Visa Account Updater (VAU)

Visa Account Updater (VAU) is a free, automated Visa service provided that securely shares updated card information—such as new card numbers or expiration dates—with participating merchants. It is designed to prevent service disruptions for recurring payments and subscriptions when your debit or credit card expires, is lost, or is reissued.

Key aspects

• Merchant participation: Not all merchants participate in the VAU program. A cardholder may still need to manually update their information with smaller businesses or services that do not subscribe to the service.
• Opt-out option: While a cardholder is typically enrolled in VAU automatically when they receive a new card, you can opt them out of the service at any time via the Pismo opt-out endpoint .

For more information about VAU, refer to Visa Account Updater Overview.

VAU implementation

To start the implementation of VAU for a customer/environment, follow these steps:

Step 1 : Contact Visa and initiate a Visa project

• Multi-tenant environments - Request the project as Multi-Issuer.
• Single-tenant environments - Request the project as Single-Issuer.

Step 2: Set up Initial environment

Once the project request is submitted, VISA will provide a set of forms you need to complete. These forms are required for:

• Visa Issuer configuration
• File transmission set up via SFTP (VFT/VFES).

The Cards team can assist with:

• Providing the PCI environment IP addresses to be associated with the account, those can be found on this doc: Pismo Outbound Public IPs
• Generating the SSH key (VISA requirement) for SFTP connection setup. Support ticket example for SSH key creation: ISD-44509 – please note that GRC action is required

1. Receive configuration data from VISA, example:

Service(s):  VAU  
Bank Name: Pismo Labs Inc  
BID/PID/SID: BID: XXXXXX, NCN ID: XXXXXX, Multi-issuer ID: XXXX  
VFT ID:  VFTXXXXXXXX

The Cards team can then support with:

• Testing in the sandbox environment, as usually requested by VISA.
• Configuration in the production environment.

Endpoints

• Visa automatic updater opt-in — Opt a card back into VAU after it has been opted out
• Automatic updater opt-out — Opt a card out of VAU or ABU