Online authorizations provide immediate fund availability confirmations. The customer's
financial institution also reduces the amount of credit available in the customer's account,
setting aside the authorized funds for the merchant to capture a later time. Authorizations
for most payment cards are processed online. Typically, it is safe to start fulfilling the
order once you receive an authorization confirmation.
An online authorization confirmation and the subsequent hold on funds will expire after a
specific length of time. Thus it is important to capture funds in a timely manner. The
issuing bank sets the expiration time interval but most authorizations expire within five to
seven days.
The issuing bank does not inform
Cybersource
when an authorization
confirmation expires. By default, the authorization information for each transaction remains
in the Cybersource
database for 60 days after the authorization date. To
capture an authorization that expired with the issuing bank, you can resubmit the
authorization request.