Transaction Processing Timeline - Canada

Information about the lifecycle of a transaction.

When a Merchant submits a new payment it begins a cycle of communication between Payrix, the cardholder’s (i.e. issuing) bank, and the processing bank. Each of these entities works together to transfer the money from the customer into the Merchant’s Payrix account, and from there to the Merchant’s bank account.

Although the processing cycle varies slightly for different payment types (i.e. Sale transactions differ from eCheck payments), there are several standard statuses that a payment may have throughout this process.

What are the transaction statuses and what do they mean?

• Approved - The payment submitted by a Merchant was authorized by the issuing bank, confirming the availability of the funds, in addition to validating the cardholder’s submitted CVV & AVS (address) information. The funds related to an Approved transaction will not be sent to the Merchant’s Payrix account until the payment is submitted to Capture and Settle as part of the Merchant’s daily batch.
  

• Captured - The Captured status means an approved payment was sent to the processing bank as part of their daily batch to begin the process of transferring funds from the cardholder to the Merchant’s Payrix account.
  

• Settled - Settled indicates that the process of transferring funds between the cardholder and the Merchant’s Payrix account is now completed, and the money is now part of the Merchant’s Available Balance.
  

• Failed - This status indicates that the attempted transaction failed authorization by the cardholder’s bank, and thus, the payment is invalid and will not be Captured or Settled.
  

• Refunded - After a payment is already Settled, a Merchant can reverse it by issuing a refund back to the cardholder’s bank. The money related to a refunded transaction will then be deducted from the Merchant’s Available Balance.

While a payment is still within the Approved status, it cannot be refunded as no funds have yet been transferred from the cardholder. A Merchant has two options for reversing an Approved transaction:

• Canceled - While a payment is still within the Approved status, a Merchant can reverse it by Canceling the transaction. Canceling a payment removes the Approved transaction from their daily batch, and thus, it isn’t sent to the processing bank and the money isn’t withdrawn from the cardholder nor transferred to the Merchant’s Payrix account.
  Because the payment was already authorized and Canceling a transaction doesn’t reverse the authorization, a Merchant can Cancel a payment, but then re-add it to their batch if the circumstances change within 24 hours of the transaction being submitted.
  

• Voided - The second option for reversing an Approved payment is to Void the transaction. Voiding a transaction reverses the existing authorization, and thus, it is a permanent action. Once Voided, a payment cannot be re-added to the Merchant’s batch at any point.