Using a pre-paid credit card? Here’s something important you might not be aware of

If you use a pre-paid credit card (such as Payzonemoney) you should be aware of this.

When you place an order on a website for items not currently in stock, the seller will quite often “pre-authorise” your credit card to ensure there is adequate funds in the account. The transaction will be flagged as “pending” by the credit card company.

When your item comes into stock and is ready to be shipped, the seller the charges the card and the amount is then part of your outstanding balance.

With a regular credit card, all of this will never cause you any issues – but with a pre-paid credit card it might do as I discovered today.

I ordered a hard to find book from the UK (€100 value). The book company pre-authorised my Payzonemoney card for the full amount which went through fine as I had loaded the card with €150 to cover the cost of the book.

Just over 2 weeks later the book has come in and is ready to ship but I got a notification of payment failure. That’s when I discovered that to handle this “pre-authorisation” process, the card needs at least €100 on it for the charge to go through.

So this is something you will need to watch out for when placing orders online for items not currently in stock or pre-ordering goods. Just make sure that you have double the amount on your pre-paid credit card to ensure there are no delays when it comes time for the items to ship.