Direct answer: there is no official source confirming a 13% approval rate at PerfectPay, so treat that number as a rumor, not a fact. The only public reference is the one Mundpay discloses: reports of cases of approval below 15% when migrating operations. What really matters is the phenomenon of low approval, which happens on several platforms because of the buyer's country, the card brand, antifraud, and the routing of declined transactions. For international sales, approval above 80% is considered good. And a good part of the drop is recoverable with smart retry and proactive risk.

Why are so many sellers asking about a 13% approval rate?

PerfectPay is an established, straightforward, and competent Brazilian platform in the domestic market. Nothing in this analysis denies that. Even so, a specific number has become a topic in digital seller groups: the idea that sales approval would fall to something close to 13%.

When you look for the exact origin of that digit, you do not find it. There is no official report, no public audit, and no communication from PerfectPay itself pinning down that rate. It is the kind of number that spreads by word of mouth because it describes a real pain that a lot of people have felt, even though no one can cite the source.

That is why this article will not claim that PerfectPay has a 13% approval rate. It will do something more useful: explain why approval drops in some operations, what is the platform's responsibility, what is the seller's, and what you can do to recover what you are losing.

What does Mundpay actually disclose about low approval?

According to data published by Mundpay, sellers who migrated operations report cases of approval below 15%. Notice the wording, because it is deliberate. These are reported cases, not an official average rate for any named competitor.

The difference between the two is significant. "Cases of approval below 15%" describes extreme situations that happened to specific operations, under specific conditions. It is not the same as saying "platform X approves 13% of sales," a claim that would require a source no one has.

Mundpay cites these cases to mark a contrast with its own standard: for international sales, approval above 80% is what it considers good. When the gap between 80% and 15% shows up on the same results screen, the seller understands, without needing a magic number, that there is a lot of revenue being left on the table. The point is the range, not the exact digit.

Why does the approval rate drop?

Approval is not a fixed characteristic of a brand, it is the result of four variables that combine on every transaction. Understanding each one takes the mystery out of the subject:

  • Buyer's country. A sale to the United States or Europe passes through different issuing bank rules than a sale in Brazil. The same checkout can approve very well here and get stuck abroad if the infrastructure is not prepared for international payments.
  • Card brand. Each brand has its own risk behavior. A card that goes through smoothly at one acquirer gets declined at another, and the platform needs to know how to handle that.
  • Antifraud. A poorly calibrated filter declines good sales along with fraud. Antifraud that is too aggressive drags down approval; too lax, and it fills the operation with chargebacks. The balance is what separates a good platform from a bad one.
  • Routing of declines. This is where the biggest silent loss lives. When a card is declined, the transaction can be reprocessed by another acquirer in a fraction of a second. If the platform simply discards the decline, that sale dies right there.

That is why the same store, with the same product and the same traffic, can register completely different approval rates on two platforms. It was not the market that changed. It was the infrastructure that decides, transaction by transaction, whether the card goes through. Measuring this separately, as the analysis of approval rate by country with UTM and analytics shows, reveals where the drop actually happens.

What is the platform's responsibility and what is the seller's?

Putting all the blame on the gateway is comfortable, but incomplete. Approval is a shared responsibility, and recognizing that is what allows you to actually act.

It falls to the platform: route declined transactions to alternative acquirers, calibrate antifraud so it does not discard good sales, offer genuine international processing, and maintain a risk team that solves problems before blocking the seller. That is infrastructure, and the seller alone cannot build it.

It falls to the seller: keep the business model clean, choose products and markets well, take care of the quality of the traffic sent to the checkout, and monitor their own numbers instead of looking only at the overall average. Bad traffic or an extremely high-risk niche drags down approval on any platform.

The practical conclusion is direct: if you have done your part and approval is still on the floor, the problem is in the infrastructure, and switching platforms stops being drama and becomes a business decision.

How do you recover approval that is being lost?

The good news is that a significant part of the lost approval is recoverable without spending an extra cent on traffic. These are sales that already reached the checkout and just need an infrastructure that does not discard them. Three levers make the difference:

  • Smart retry. Upon detecting a decline, the system reprocesses the transaction through another acquirer right away, without the buyer repeating their details. See how smart payment retry turns a decline into an approved sale.
  • Proactive risk team. Instead of blocking the account without warning, the risk team contacts the seller before any restriction. At Mundpay, around 90% of alerts are resolved before turning into a chargeback, which preserves the health of the operation and approval itself.
  • Measurement by country and brand. The overall average is misleading. When you break down approval by destination, you discover that the loss is often concentrated in one country or one specific brand, and then the fix is surgical instead of generic.

These three levers are native to Mundpay, and that is the difference the direct comparison between Mundpay and PerfectPay on approval details number by number, without relying on rumors.

If you apply one thing from this article, make it separating an issuer decline from an anti fraud decline. They are different problems, and the fix for one makes the other worse.

Wellington CostaGlobal Payments Specialist

What should you do now, in practice?

Ignore the digit that is circulating and do the diagnosis that really matters:

  • Pull your real approval rate, segmented by country and by brand, not just the average. Where is the biggest drop?
  • Ask your platform whether it reprocesses declined transactions and how it handles risk. If the answer is vague, that is the signal.
  • Compare the number you have today with the reference level for international sales, approval above 80%, and calculate how much the difference represents in revenue.

If your operation sells outside Brazil and approval is well below that level, the problem is rarely the product. It is the infrastructure behind the checkout. And unlike the 13% rumor, this is a number you can measure, compare, and fix. The cost details are open on the payments and fees page.

In Short: The 13% Approval Rate and the Phenomenon Behind It

  • There is no official 13% approval rate from PerfectPay; the number circulates among sellers with no confirmed source and should be treated as a rumor.
  • The only public reference is the one Mundpay discloses: reports of approval cases below 15% when migrating operations, that is, reported cases, not an official average rate.
  • PerfectPay is an established, straightforward Brazilian platform in the domestic market; the discussion here is about approval, not about the company.
  • Approval drops for four reasons: the buyer's country, the card brand, antifraud, and the routing of declined transactions.
  • For international sales, approval above 80% is considered good; below that, revenue is being lost on traffic already paid for.
  • Part of the loss is recoverable with smart retry, a proactive risk team, and measuring approval by country and brand.

Approval rate is the number that decides the month. A ten point difference in that rate is ten percent of revenue you already paid traffic for and never collected.

Wellington CostaGlobal Payments Specialist

Frequently Asked Questions About Approval and the PerfectPay Case

Does PerfectPay really have a 13% approval rate?

There is no official 13% rate published by PerfectPay. The number circulates among sellers with no confirmed source. The only public reference is what Mundpay discloses: reports of approval cases below 15% on other platforms. What matters is not pinning down a single digit, it is understanding the phenomenon: in some operations, mainly international sales, approval falls well below what is expected. PerfectPay is an established, straightforward Brazilian platform in the domestic market, and the discussion here is about approval, not about the company itself.

Where does the low approval number cited by Mundpay come from?

According to data published by Mundpay, sellers report cases of approval below 15% when migrating operations. That figure describes reported cases, not an official average rate for any competitor. Mundpay's point in citing these cases is to show the contrast with what it considers good for international sales: approval above 80%. Treat numbers that circulate without a source with skepticism and focus on the cause of the drop, which is what you can actually measure and fix.

Why does the approval rate drop on some platforms?

Approval depends on four main factors: the buyer's country, the card brand, the gateway's antifraud system, and the routing of declined transactions. An international sale passes through more layers of risk than a domestic sale, and every decline that is not reprocessed becomes a lost sale. When the platform does not route declined transactions well or does not handle risk proactively, approval falls. It is not a fixed number tied to a competitor, it is the result of how each layer is configured.

What can the seller do to recover approval?

First, measure approval by country and by card brand, because the average hides where the loss happens. Then, make sure the platform reprocesses declined transactions with smart retry, routing the denied sale to alternative acquirers without the buyer repeating their details. Finally, choose a gateway with a proactive risk team, one that talks to the seller before restricting. At Mundpay, these three points are native and help recover sales that a poor setup would otherwise discard.

What approval rate is considered good in international sales?

For international sales, approval above 80% is considered good. Below that, every point lost is revenue leaving the operation even with traffic already paid for. The factors that most affect it are the buyer's country, the card brand, the seller's business model, and the gateway's antifraud system. That is why the same store can have very different approval rates on two platforms: it is not the product that changed, it is the infrastructure that decides whether the card goes through or not.