What causes a sale to be "Pending"?
What causes a sale to be Pending for several hours or days then disappear?
Is it because a buyers payment method has failed? if so a shocking amount of people can’t even enter their payment details correctly…
26 replies
Seller_hC0hNVDuILaKO
It may be that the buyers card was not validated as you suggest, but not necessarily because they couldn’t enter the details correctly, they may have had an old card on file, or insufficient funds available…
Seller_xUKHc5xSYJmI4
Pending order is usually a customer who has
- Failed to go to the checkout.
- Has payment method that has expired but does not update it.
- The bank has refused the payment because they are overdrawn.
- Or something who forgot how to get to the till and has the item still in basket.
- Had one too many the night before
Seller_EJIX7rqDNQJi2
You are right, there is usually an issue with the buyer’s card as the order won’t go through without Amazon being able to place a hold on a sum corresponding to the order total. Therefore, there are insufficient funds available.
Here you can learn more about Pending orders:
Seller_L3E8iknKXqZNV
Most pending orders though seem to be validated to full status after 20 minutes.
There are others that stick around for several days and then vanish
Seller_DROodOAYHftnc
All orders are pending for 30 minutes, in which time to allow buyer time to cancel.
Can be pending for up to 10 days.
Most frequent reason is card has expired and they have not changed the details in their Amazon account.
Seller_nKqNWKHfZWsny
There is another pending “fiend” we have seen. A buyer who takes all the stock available and doesnt pay, and should be reported. This may be a tactic for expanding own sales, and we have seen this happen a couple of times in 10 years. Obviously its anonymous to the seller, but must be a competitor or malicious actor.
Seller_kHIYvQFgzwVAy
Sometimes you can get customers where their order is pending for ages then it eventually comes through and the order will say that it was from 10 days ago and you get some bad mark on your account for not shipping it …
Seller_gcApEu4yzoNNw
or a competitor has done it to try to tie up your stock to sell theirs
