Authorization Transaction
The Authorization transaction enables you to confirm that a customer has submitted a valid payment method with their order and has sufficient funds to purchase the goods or services they ordered. Setting the <allowPartialAuth> element to true in the Authorization request enables the system to return authorizations for a portion of the order amount for cases where the card does not have an adequate credit limit or balance available for the full amount.
An approved Authorization reduces the customer's credit limit (or bank balance, in the case of a debit card) by the amount of the approval by placing the amount on hold. If you have the Prepaid Indicator feature enabled, the Authorization response also includes an element that indicates if the card is Prepaid, as well as an element indicating the available balance on the card.
To obtain better interchange rates, you should always perform an AVS check either as a standalone transaction, or as part of the Authorization/Sale transaction.
If you settle in a currency other than US or Canada, you cannot use partial Authorizations.
While most merchants perform Authorizations as Online transactions, there is no requirement to do so.
The lifespan of an Authorization depends upon the payment method. TABLE 1-15 Lifespan of Payment Authorizations provides information concerning Authorization lifespans for various card types and alternate payment methods.
TABLE 1-15 Lifespan of Payment Authorizations
|
Payment Type |
Lifespan of Authorization |
|---|---|
|
Mastercard |
7 days |
|
Visa |
7 days |
|
American Express |
7 days |
|
Discover |
10 days |
|
PayPal |
29 days total by default; Worldpay recommends capture submission within three days. For more information, see the Worldpay eComm PayPal Integration Guide. |
As long as the authorization has not expired, or the amount exhausted, you can use it repeatedly to fulfill an order. This would be the case if the Authorization covered multiple items with staggered deliveries. In this scenario, you would issue a Partial Capture transaction as each item shipped until the order was completely fulfilled.
If you obtain an Authorization through approved vendors for voice and terminal authorizations, you would use a Capture Given Auth transaction to deposit the funds (see Capture Given Auth Transaction).