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Troubleshooting Unsuccessful Payment Attempts
Troubleshooting Unsuccessful Payment Attempts
Updated over 6 months ago

We understand that it can be very frustrating when you expect to make a payment but receive the pop-up message that status it was not approved. Your clients see a generic message that says the payment could not be processed at this time but, if they contact you to see what happened, the information you need is located in ClientPay.

  • Go to Payment Manager > Payment Search

  • Using the Advanced Search section, select [Status] [Is Not] [Approved]

  • Click Search

  • Within the results grid, the Status column will tell you why the payment was not successful.

  • Double click an item to View Details

  • The reason will appear at the top of the screen.

decline_reason_1.png

There are several reasons for failed payments.

A Decline comes directly from the issuing bank; it means that they are not allowing the payment to be approved. In most cases, the message is brief but a good indicator of the bank's reason. The most common message you will see is "Do Not Honor." This message is their way of quickly telling a merchant not to complete the sale.

An Error, however, could be the result of a technical issue but there is no telling where the issue may have occurred during the communication process with the issuing bank. We encourage you to reach out to [email protected] for assistance.

Reasons Why Payments Decline

  • Invalid payment method information. The most common reason for this error is mistyped data. If the client is confident the account is open and active with available funds, we recommend asking them to try again paying extra attention to accuracy.

  • Daily processing limits at the issuing bank. Some banks put limits on the size of the transaction or the amount of transactions allowed per day. If the decline message mentions limits, it's a good indicator that this is the issue.

  • Security policies at the issuing bank. Some flags monitor activity and proactively flag accounts, effectively declining any new authorizations, for things like first time purchases, larger than normal amounts, excessive declines and suspicious activity.

Steps you can take to resolve the issue

  • Retry the payment paying extra attention to accuracy.

  • Have your client contact their bank for more information and to resolve the issue.

  • Try another payment method.

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