Payment & Security Policy
This page explains exactly how Pepticore.co accepts and processes payment, how we protect your billing information, how sales tax is calculated, and what happens if a charge is declined, disputed, or flagged for review — in plain, specific language, for every order placed on our site.
The short version
Every payment on Pepticore.co is processed in U.S. dollars, over an encrypted connection, through a PCI DSS-compliant third-party payment gateway. We never see or store your full card number. Every order is address- and identity-checked before it ships, sales tax is calculated automatically based on your delivery address, and you receive a lot-specific invoice by email the moment your payment clears.
This Payment & Security Policy supplements, and does not replace, our Terms of Service, Privacy Policy, and Return & Refund Policy.
Accepted payment methods
We keep checkout deliberately simple and secure. Pepticore.co currently accepts the following payment methods, all processed through our encrypted, PCI DSS-compliant checkout:
Methods we do not accept
To keep our order-verification process consistent and auditable, we do not currently accept ACH bank transfers, wire transfers, cryptocurrency, personal checks, money orders, cash, or gift cards. If this changes, this policy will be updated before the new method appears at checkout. All available payment methods are displayed directly on the checkout page — the presence of a payment logo at checkout confirms it is currently accepted.
All transactions are in U.S. dollars
Every price displayed on Pepticore.co — on product listings, in your cart, and at checkout — is stated in United States Dollars (USD). We do not display or accept payment in any other currency. If your card is issued by a non-U.S. bank, your bank or card network will convert the USD charge to your local currency at their own exchange rate, and may apply a foreign transaction fee; that fee, if any, is set by your card issuer, not by Pepticore, and does not appear on our invoice.
Keeping your billing information accurate
It is the buyer’s responsibility to enter accurate details
You are responsible for entering the correct cardholder name, billing address, billing zip/postal code, card number, expiration date, and security code (CVV) at checkout, and for keeping that information current with your card issuer or wallet provider. Pepticore is not responsible for a payment failure, order delay, or account lock caused by outdated or incorrect billing information you supplied.
Billing address must match your card issuer’s records
Our checkout runs an Address Verification System (AVS) check comparing the billing address you enter against the address on file with your card issuer. A mismatch — even a small one, such as an abbreviated street suffix — can cause an authorization to be declined or flagged for manual review.
You can correct details before an order is placed
Once payment has been authorized and an order confirmation has been issued, we are unable to edit the card or billing details tied to that specific transaction. Please review your billing details on the checkout screen before submitting an order.
How we secure your payment information
Pepticore.co is served entirely over HTTPS with 256-bit SSL/TLS encryption. Every page that collects personal or payment information — including our cart and checkout — is encrypted in transit, so data passing between your browser and our servers cannot be read by a third party.
Card payments are processed through a PCI DSS-compliant (Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard) third-party payment gateway. Your full card number, expiration date, and CVV are transmitted directly to that gateway using tokenization and are never stored in plain text on Pepticore’s own servers. We retain only the limited transaction record needed for order history, invoicing, and fraud review — such as the order total, approval status, and the last four digits of the card used.
Digital wallet payments made with Google Pay or Amazon Pay use each provider’s own encrypted authentication (including device-level biometric or PIN verification where enabled by the buyer), and Pepticore never receives your underlying card number for those transactions at all — only a payment token and an authorization result.
SSL/TLS
Encrypted, end to end
Every checkout session is encrypted from your browser to our payment gateway. Card data is tokenized and never stored on Pepticore’s own servers.
Third-party payment processor disclosure
Pepticore.co does not operate its own payment infrastructure. All card and digital-wallet transactions are authorized, processed, and settled by an independent, PCI DSS Level 1-certified payment processor integrated into our WordPress checkout. That processor — not Pepticore or Renaissance Wave LLC — is the entity that receives, transmits, and temporarily handles your raw card data during authorization.
Because processing is outsourced to a specialist provider, your payment is subject to that processor’s own security architecture, fraud-scoring systems, and data-handling terms, in addition to our own Privacy Policy. We select payment processors that maintain current PCI DSS certification and standard card-network compliance (Visa, Mastercard, and American Express network rules), and we review that certification status periodically as part of our own compliance obligations.
Neither Pepticore nor Renaissance Wave LLC sells, rents, or shares your payment card data with any unrelated third party. Card data is used solely to process the transaction you authorized, to prevent fraud, and to process any refund you are entitled to under our Return & Refund Policy.
Failed & declined payment handling
A payment can be declined for several common reasons: insufficient funds or available credit, an expired card, an AVS or CVV mismatch, your bank’s own fraud filter flagging an unfamiliar merchant, or a card-issuer block on research-chemical or nutraceutical-adjacent merchant categories. Here is exactly what happens on our end:
attempted
order held, not charged
by email
different method
If your payment is declined, no order is created and no product ships. Depending on your bank, you may briefly see a pending “authorization hold” for the attempted amount; this is placed and released entirely by your card issuer and is never captured or kept by Pepticore for a declined transaction. We will email the address you entered at checkout to let you know the attempt did not succeed, without disclosing the specific decline reason returned by your bank, since that information is generally only available to the cardholder directly from their issuer. You are welcome to try again with the same method after correcting your billing details, or to use a different accepted payment method. An order that remains unpaid is automatically cancelled and released from our system; it is never shipped, invoiced, or reported as a completed sale.
Sales tax: how and where it’s collected
California — our home state
Renaissance Wave LLC is registered and headquartered in California, and our fulfillment warehouse operates in Fontana, California. Because we have physical nexus in California, we are required to, and do, collect California sales tax — administered by the California Department of Tax and Fee Administration (CDTFA) — on every order shipped to a California address, at the combined state, county, and district rate that applies to the delivery ZIP code.
Other states — economic nexus
Following the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in South Dakota v. Wayfair, Inc. (2018), states may require an out-of-state seller to collect sales tax once it crosses that state’s economic-nexus threshold (commonly a set dollar amount or number of transactions delivered into that state in a given year). As our sales volume into a given state crosses that state’s threshold, we register with that state’s tax authority and begin collecting and remitting its sales tax automatically at checkout. Because thresholds and rates change by state and by year, we do not publish a fixed 50-state table here — instead, applicable tax is calculated live, by your exact delivery address, at checkout, and itemized on your invoice before you confirm payment.
What tax applies to
Where required by state law, sales tax is calculated on the taxable product subtotal and, in states that tax shipping and handling charges, on the shipping fee as well. Tax is never estimated after the fact — the exact amount is shown on the order review screen before you submit payment, and again on your emailed invoice.
Tax-exempt buyers
Institutional or business buyers holding a valid state resale or exemption certificate may contact contact@pepticore.co before ordering to have tax-exempt status reviewed and, if approved, applied to their account. If no exemption certificate is on file, standard sales tax is collected on the order at checkout, and buyers remain independently responsible for any consumer use tax owed directly to their home state on untaxed purchases, exactly as they would with any other online retailer.
Receipts & invoices, issued automatically
Emailed the moment payment clears
A digital invoice is sent automatically to the email address used at checkout as soon as your payment is authorized, showing the order number, each item and lot number purchased, unit pricing, tax charged, shipping cost, and the total amount billed.
Tied to your Certificate of Analysis
Because each invoice references the specific lot number shipped, you can cross-reference your order directly against the matching Certificate of Analysis in our certificate vault.
Duplicate copies on request
Misplaced an invoice, or need a copy for institutional purchasing or expense records? Email contact@pepticore.co with your order number and we will resend it within one business day.
Fraud prevention measures
Address Verification System (AVS) and CVV matching
Every card transaction is checked against the billing address and card security code on file with the issuing bank before authorization completes.
Device, IP, and velocity screening
Our payment gateway evaluates signals such as IP location, device fingerprint, and unusual order frequency to flag transactions that show common patterns of card testing or account takeover.
Manual review of high-risk orders
Orders that trigger a fraud-risk flag — for example, a mismatched billing and shipping address, an unusually large first-time order, or a rushed shipping request paired with a new account — are held for manual review before they are charged or shipped. We may contact the buyer for additional identity or research-eligibility verification, consistent with the buyer-eligibility terms described in our Terms of Service.
Right to decline or cancel
We reserve the right to decline, delay, or cancel and fully refund any order we reasonably believe to be fraudulent, unauthorized, placed by someone under 21, or inconsistent with the research-use eligibility requirements described in our Legal Notice.
Chargeback policy & dispute process
If a charge on your statement looks unfamiliar or incorrect, please contact us first — most issues are resolved faster, and without a formal dispute, by emailing contact@pepticore.co directly.
Contact us first
Email your order number and a description of the issue. We aim to respond within one business day and can typically resolve billing errors, duplicate charges, or shipping concerns directly, without a bank dispute.
If a chargeback is filed
Should a chargeback be filed with your card issuer instead, we will respond through the card network’s formal dispute process and submit supporting evidence, including proof of authorization, shipment tracking, delivery confirmation, our Terms of Service acceptance record, and the relevant Certificate of Analysis.
Outcome & account status
The card network — not Pepticore — makes the final ruling on a chargeback. A chargeback later found to be filed in bad faith on a correctly fulfilled order, in violation of the cardholder agreement with the issuing bank, may result in suspension of the associated Pepticore account from future orders, consistent with our Terms of Service.
Filing a chargeback for an order that was accurately charged, correctly fulfilled, and used outside the buyer’s stated research purpose does not relieve the buyer of the prohibited-use responsibilities set out in our Legal Notice.
Federal payment & consumer protection laws we follow
FTC Mail, Internet, or Telephone Order Merchandise Rule (16 C.F.R. Part 435)
We ship what you ordered within the timeframe stated at checkout, or notify you promptly of any delay with the option to cancel for a full refund. Your card is not charged before your order is confirmed and prepared for shipment, consistent with this Rule’s timing requirements.
FTC Act, Section 5 — unfair or deceptive acts and practices
The Federal Trade Commission prohibits unfair or deceptive practices in commerce, including misleading billing, hidden fees, or unauthorized charges. We display the full order total — item price, tax, and shipping — before you confirm payment, with no surprise charges added afterward.
Fair Credit Billing Act (FCBA)
If you paid by credit card, the Fair Credit Billing Act gives you the right to dispute billing errors directly with your card issuer, including charges for goods not delivered as agreed. We fully support this process and provide our card-network dispute response promptly when a claim is opened.
Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA) safeguards standard
Our payment processor maintains administrative, technical, and physical safeguards for financial data consistent with the GLBA Safeguards Rule framework used across the U.S. payments industry, in addition to card-network PCI DSS requirements.
Internal Revenue Code & state sales/use tax law
We collect and remit sales tax in accordance with applicable state statutes and the economic-nexus framework established by South Dakota v. Wayfair, Inc., and we maintain transaction records consistent with applicable federal and state recordkeeping requirements.
State & regional payment rules we follow
Payment and consumer-protection regulation varies by state. Beyond the federal rules above, all 50 states and the District of Columbia maintain their own consumer protection and Unfair-or-Deceptive-Acts-and-Practices (UDAP) statutes, and several states impose specific billing, tax, or disclosure requirements on online sellers. Below are the items most relevant to how we bill and collect tax today.
Home state — CDTFA, CLRA & UCL
As a California-registered, California-warehousing business, we comply with the California Department of Tax and Fee Administration’s sales and use tax rules, the Consumers Legal Remedies Act (Cal. Civ. Code § 1750 et seq.), and California’s Unfair Competition Law and false-advertising statutes (Bus. & Prof. Code §§ 17200, 17500) in how we bill, disclose pricing, and process refunds.
Post-Wayfair sales tax registration
As our sales into a given state cross that state’s Wayfair economic-nexus threshold, we register with that state’s department of revenue and begin collecting and remitting its sales tax automatically — calculated at checkout by your exact delivery address, never estimated or applied retroactively.
Consumer protection & UDAP statutes
Every state maintains a consumer protection or UDAP law covering advertising accuracy, billing practices, and order fulfilment. We hold our checkout, billing, and customer communications to the strictest applicable state standard, not just the federal minimum, regardless of which state a buyer orders from.
Our commitment on emerging state law: because sales tax nexus thresholds, remote-seller registration rules, and state privacy/security statutes continue to change, we do not attempt to list every state’s individual requirement here as a static, unchanging table. Instead, our tax and payment systems are updated as state rules change, applicable tax is always calculated live at checkout by delivery address, and we reserve the right to restrict, delay, or decline a payment or shipment to any state or buyer where we reasonably believe completing the transaction would violate state law.
Your rights as a Pepticore buyer
Accurate, itemized billing
You are entitled to see the full order total — price, tax, and shipping — before confirming payment, and to receive an itemized invoice by email for every completed order.
No charge without shipment
Under the FTC Mail/Internet Order Rule, we do not collect payment for an order we cannot fulfil within the disclosed timeframe without notifying you and offering a full refund.
Refunds & disputes
Our Return & Refund Policy sets out how order issues, damaged shipments, and billing disputes are resolved, in addition to your right to dispute an unauthorized charge directly with your card issuer.
Changes to this policy
Because payment regulation, card-network rules, and state tax law continue to evolve, we review this Payment & Security Policy regularly and update it whenever our payment processor, accepted methods, tax obligations, or the applicable legal framework change. The “last updated” date at the top of this page always reflects the current version. Continued use of Pepticore.co after an update constitutes acceptance of the revised policy. We encourage buyers to review this page periodically, particularly before placing a repeat order.
Talk to a real person, weekdays
If a charge looks wrong, a payment failed, or you’d like a duplicate invoice, our support team responds within one business day.