Credit Card Payment Failure

If an error message is received when collecting a payment, this indicates that the payment from the credit card has failed and the order did not process.

Common Error Codes:

• Declined - 30002: DECLINED: This means that the card holder's credit card company has blocked the transaction. Have the client call the 800 number on the back of the card and find out why.
• Declined - RESTRICTED: This means the cardholder has been traveling or has used their card outside of their normal spending habits. This comes directly from the card-issuing bank. Card holder can contact the number on the back of card to find specific details. Cardholder can also confirm with the card-issuing bank if the card can be re-tried or if another payment method should be used.
• 01    Call: This means that the card holder's credit card company has blocked the transaction. Have the client call the 800 number on the back of the card and find out why.
• 12    Decline - Invalid Transaction.  Same as 30002
• 14    Card Number Error Account number entered incorrectly (bad swipe or miss typed). Verify account number with customer and re-enter (or re-swipe if card is on hand). Please verify that you are typing in the credit card information correctly and run the transaction again.
• 51    Decline    Insufficient funds. They do not have enough money in their account.
• 61    Decline    Exceeds issuer withdrawal limit. Card cannot be used until withdrawal limit has been increased/lifted.

If you receive an error code that is not listed, you may search for this code in google.

What is an Authorization Hold?

An authorization hold is just what it sounds like: a hold put on funds, pending authorization. Sometimes known as card authorizations or pre-authorizations (pre-auths), merchants can use authorization holds to temporarily lock the funds for a particular transaction, ensuring they actually get paid for purchases made via credit or debit card. The process is easy to understand, but first a little background is needed.

Completing a payment card transaction involves two steps: 1) authorizing the purchase and 2) settling the transaction. The authorization process doesn’t transfer funds from the cardholder to the merchant. It’s simply the bank’s way of telling the merchant that the funds for a purchase exist.

When a customer pays with a credit or debit card, the merchant contacts the cardholder’s issuing bank and requests an authorization code. The bank’s response to the authorization request will tell the merchant how to proceed

How Do Authorization Holds Work?

As noted above, there are some industries that make consistent effective use of pre-auths, primarily hotels and gas stations. Step-by-step, the process works like this:

A payment card is swiped at a gas pump. The issuing bank automatically puts a hold on a predetermined amount of funds or available credit. Once the sale is complete, the transaction is submitted for settling. The temporary hold is released. The final cost of the purchase is transferred from the customer’s account to the merchant. If the process was that immediate, there would be no need for authorization holds. The reality, however, is that the actual transferring of funds only happens after the merchant has submitted a batch of transactions to the acquiring bank, which does not happen until end day after business hours.