Authorise payments to reserve funds

When creating a single payment order, you can select the Pre-authorise option to authorise the payment, which will reserve an amount on the customer's card for a few days.

If the payment is authorised, the order status becomes Active.

The authorised payment with the type of PA is in the Related Transactions list.

For the authorised payment, you can click the round arrow buttons to:

• Capture the payment to charge the card; or
• Refund the payment to reverse the pre-authorisation and release the reserved funds from the customer's card.

When you capture the payment, you can capture the full amount or enter a partial amount to capture.

After the capture is processed, the status of single payment order becomes Complete.

The capture transaction appears in the Related Transactions list with the transaction type of CP. You can use the round-arrow Refund button to make a full or partial refund, as for any debit (DB) transaction.

The amount of time that a payment is held before it is automatically released depends on the issuing bank but it is usually around one week.

This dual flow for single payment orders introduces a new use of the Active order status in BillPro. A single payment order with the pre-authorise option first becomes Active until the authorised payment is captured or reversed, and then it becomes Complete.

There have also been changes to the email notifications.

1. The Order is Ready email has "Authorisation Amount" to let the customer know that the payment will be authorised for later collection.
2. When the payment is authorised, a Payment Confirmation email is sent with the heading "Your card was authorised".