I have a neighbour who does a bit of online purchasing - some on eBay and some not. Like many people, they are only interested in an honest purchase, not to rip anybody off - so their buying history is exemplary.
However, they placed an order with a Canadian business through their website with payment via PayPal. Since the business had to confirm stock availability, they did a 'pre-authorisation' for the full amount (over $300 AUD) to ensure funds were available. The final charge would be put through when the order was finalised.
Unfortunately, the vendor's payment gateway 'flagged' the transaction as a high risk and that it should not be accepted, so they cancelled the order. Mind you, they did not notify my neighbour. They only found out when they started chasing up the status of the order. The vendor also declined to give any details as to why the order was cancelled.
BUT.... the pre-authorisation is still in place. My neighbour's PayPal balance still has the funds debited.
They have contacted PayPal ... who have said the merchant needs to cancel the transaction.
They have contacted the merchant ... who has said the authorisation will automatically 'drop off' after 3 days.
I've not gone into the PayPal side of things, but I do know a bit about plastic. The merchant's statement is correct for credit card processing, but is the same process in place for PayPal? Is the merchant - incorrectly - looking at PayPal pre-auths in the same way as credit card auths?
Can anyone help?
