Timing, end to end

Scheme deadlines on this page are published rules and are linked. Funding times are typical ranges and depend on your contract, so treat those as shape rather than fact.

The whole path

Step by step

Step	Typical elapsed	Who controls it
Authorization request and response	Under a second	Network and issuer
Hold appears on the cardholder's account	Immediately, or a few minutes	Issuer
Capture	Seconds if card present, days if you ship first	You
Batch close	The daily cut-off	Your processor
Clearing submitted and priced	Overnight after batch close	Acquirer and network
Settlement between issuer and acquirer	Usually the next banking day	Network
Funding to your bank account	Commonly one to three banking days after batch close	Your contract
Refund visible to the cardholder	Several business days after you issue it	Issuer
Chargeback arrives	Days to months later	Cardholder and issuer

Deadlines you do not set

These come from the schemes, not from your processor, and missing them costs money or loses a case.

Deadline	Limit	Where it is set out
Authorization to clearing, both schemes, every transaction type	5 to 30 calendar days depending on scheme, channel and category	Authorization
Fuel dispenser preauthorization: completion or reversal	2 hours	Authorization
Reversal after a cancelled card-present sale	24 hours	Voids, reversals, and refunds
Reversal, card-not-present	72 hours	Voids, reversals, and refunds
Cardholder window to file a chargeback	Commonly 120 days, longer for some reason codes	Disputes
Merchant window to respond to a dispute	Around 30 days for Visa, 45 for Mastercard, often compressed further by the processor's own portal	Disputes
ACH return, most codes	2 banking days	ACH
ACH return, unauthorized consumer debit	60 calendar days	ACH

The capture deadlines are deliberately not itemised here. They vary by scheme, by channel and by merchant category, the two schemes count differently, and keeping a second copy in step with the first is how a table goes stale. The full breakdown and the source documents are on the authorization page.

Two things that explain most surprises

T is the batch close, not the purchase. Funding schedules get quoted as T+1 or T+2, and T is the day the batch closed. A purchase made after the cut-off belongs to tomorrow's batch and funds a day later than the receipt would suggest.

Banking days are not calendar days. Nothing settles at weekends or on bank holidays. On a T+2 schedule with an evening cut-off:

Purchase	Batch closes	Funds arrive
Tuesday morning	Tuesday evening	Thursday
Friday morning	Friday evening	Tuesday
Friday, after cut-off	Monday evening	Wednesday

Same product, same price, five days apart. Normal, and not a fault.

When money is late

Roughly in order of how often it turns out to be the answer:

1. The batch never closed.
2. Capture never ran, because the order shipped but nothing triggered it.
3. A bank holiday nobody accounted for.
4. A funding hold or a reserve.
5. Bank details wrong, so the payout came back.
6. More refunds than sales in the period, so there was nothing to fund.

Only one of those is a failure in the payments chain. Most missing money is an operational step that did not happen.

Cards and ACH have opposite shapes

Cards tell you at authorization whether the payment worked. ACH tells you days later, by not coming back. The two rails therefore need opposite designs: a card system can treat silence as success, and an ACH system cannot.

An ACH debit that has not returned is not the same as an ACH debit that succeeded. Systems built on card assumptions get this wrong and it costs real money.

The full comparison — cost, failure timing, reversal windows and whether a reversal can be contested — is on the ACH page, alongside the return codes that drive it. Cards covers the other side.

Talking to customers

Support answers

Use the answer that matches what the customer describes.

• A pending charge that disappeared: this was an authorization and it has been released. No money was taken.
• A refund that has not arrived: we sent it on the day we issued it. The remaining wait is at your bank.
• A charge that appears twice: one is the real charge, one is a hold that has not dropped yet. Give the customer a date by which it will drop.

Do not promise to speed up a refund. You cannot.

Terms introduced

• T+n — funding counted in banking days from batch close, not from purchase.
• Banking day — a day the settlement system runs. Not weekends or holidays.
• Negative net position — a period where refunds and chargebacks exceed sales.

Timing

0 of 5 answered

1. On a T+2 schedule with an evening cut-off, when does a Friday morning sale fund?

   Tuesday.Sunday.Monday.Wednesday.
2. Money is missing. Which causes are operational rather than failures in the payments chain? Select all that apply.

   The batch was never closed.Capture never ran after the order shipped.A bank holiday nobody accounted for.More refunds than sales in the period, so there was nothing to fund.
3. In a T+2 funding schedule, what is T?

   The day the batch closed.The day the customer made the purchase.The day the authorization was approved.The day the network settled.
4. In a period where refunds and chargebacks exceed sales, what happens?

   A negative net position, which the processor recovers from later batches or by debiting you.The deposit is zero and the shortfall is written off by the provider.The refunds are queued until sufficient sales offset them.The provider funds the shortfall and invoices it at month end.
5. How long can a consumer's bank take to return an ACH debit as unauthorized?

   60 calendar days.2 banking days.30 calendar days.120 calendar days.