When you visit the mall or grocery store to purchase a product, and you pay with either your debit or credit card, the transaction doesn’t post immediately. It takes a few days for the necessary checks and approval to be carried out before the transaction posts to your account. During that period, you’ll notice a pending tag when you log into your online banking. Now, in the situation that the pending tag fails to fall off after the stipulated time, you may be anxious to know how long it takes for an awaiting transaction to cancel.
It takes around 7 days for a pending transaction to cancel. This unusually happens if the merchant fails to remove the funds from your account. The duration can be 28 days for car hire and hotel reservations, including other hire transactions.
Credit and debit card payment doesn’t get processed the way some of us think. Of course, it is an online transaction, so it’s supposed to be as fast as sending an email or making a phone call. However, that is not the case. Such transactions need to undergo several processes which about four players oversee. For this reason, credit and debit card payments always take a few days before they are completed. In this article, I’ll be discussing how long it takes for a pending transaction to drop.
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How Long Does a Pending Transaction Take to Cancel?
If you make purchases with your credit or debit card, by now, you should be very familiar with the pending tag. The pending tag usually appears alongside your available balance after making a purchase with your card. When you buy a product using your debit or credit card, the money associated with the purchase is held by your bank and released to the merchant after the necessary checks and approval has been conducted.
For better understanding, here is a simple illustration. If, for instance, you walk into a mall and swipe your credit card for a product that costs $40. The $40 will be removed from your available balance and would reflect as your pending balance. Your available balance reflects funds that are available for you. In other words, your available balance shows funds that you can spend. Your pending balance, on the other hand, is money that is held from you. This money cannot be withdrawn or spent.
During the time the $40 is pending, the transaction processing will begin, and the major players in this process are:
- The merchant
- The acquiring bank
- The card issuer
- The credit card associations
Credit or debit card payments pass through the players mentioned above. Each of these players plays a significant role in completing or posting a transaction to your account. Thus if something tends to happen to one, the transaction may take longer to post. After all these players have carried out their specific tasks, the merchant receives payment from your bank, the transaction posts into your account, and the pending charge tag falls off.
It is important you note that a pending tag takes one or two days before it is posted to your account. In the event that it takes longer, don’t hesitate to contact the merchant or your bank. Sometimes, after purchasing with your credit or debit card, you tend to realize that after a few days, the pending tag refuses to drop as it is supposed to. When such happens, you may want to know how long it’ll take for the pending transaction to cancel.
A pending transaction wouldn’t stick to your account for eternity. And it usually takes around 5 days for a pending transaction to cancel. However, this may differ for some transactions or merchants. For instance, if the payment was for car hire or hotel reservations, it will take around 28 days for the transaction to drop. This also applies to other hire transactions.
While waiting for a transaction to post, you should have in mind that a pending charge can disappear and reappear. If the merchant doesn’t cancel the transaction and the money is yet to leave your account, be rest assured that it will in the coming days. So ensure you leave funds equivalent to what you purchased in your account, so whenever the transaction decides to post, there will be money in your account to make it happen.
If a pending transaction suddenly disappears from your online statement, ensure you contact the merchant or your bank to be on the safer side. Your bank should be able to explain to you why the transaction dropped off your statement. A pending transaction could disappear for the following reasons:
- If the merchant refuses to claim the funds
- If the merchant made a pending charge to request pre-authorization
- If the merchant made a mistake
Besides, your bank should be able to tell you whether the merchant still has time to reclaim the funds or whether the charge may post to your statement later.
How Long Do You Have to Cancel an Online Purchase?
What Happens When You Cancel a Pending Transaction?
People decide to cancel a pending transaction for some reason. Most times, it is often because the individual wants a refund, probably because he or she isn’t satisfied with the product or something related. Before you consider cancelling an awaiting transaction, you should note that you cannot do it independently. In other words, you cannot press a button somewhere, and voila, the transaction gets terminated. To do so, you need to contact the merchant. After the termination has been finalized, you may want to know what’ll happen next.
When you terminate an awaiting transaction, the funds associated with the transaction will be returned to the credit or debit card it was made from. This can take a few days or even weeks, depending on the merchant.
If you discovered that the product you purchased from a mall is defective, you would want to return the product and request a refund. However, this can be a little tricky if the transaction is yet to post. Some banks may advise that you wait for the transaction to post before making a dispute. On the flip side, you can reverse such a transaction, especially if you make a dispute in time. Whichever the case may be, if things work in your favor, in the end, you’ll get a refund or a reversal.
