What To Do If A Payment Fails
Failed payments and declined cards are never fun, but they do happen! To fix it, we recommend that you:
- Re-enter your payment information to make sure it's entered accurately
- Check in with your credit card company or bank to receive more details (sometimes they just need you to approve the charge!)
- Attempt to re-submit payment on your invoice
To make a new payment attempt, click the Make Payment button on your Failed invoice in the dashboard.
Tip: You may see a specific "card declined" message displayed when you proceed -- this does not mean your current attempt is declined! This message is related to your previous attempt, and will not prevent you from retrying the payment.
This button will take you to the invoice payment screen. From there you can:
- add a new credit card or bank account if necessary
- retry the charge by clicking the Confirm & Pay button!
You will then see a message letting you know whether your new attempt was successful.
Why Payments Fail
When it comes to transactions made with a credit or debit card, and especially with subscription billing, declines are normal! In fact, studies have shown that anywhere from 20% to 25% of all card transactions fail.
Here are some common reasons we see that explain why your payment may not have gone through successfully:
Credit/Debit Card Payment Failures
There are several things — including technical problems — that may go wrong after a transaction leaves AdvicePay, all of which could result in a decline. Exceeding the credit limit or daily withdrawal frequency for the card, expired cards, and even missing some credit card payments can stop the payment from going through.
Furthermore, the transaction may get declined in the processing stages due to fraud prevention: first time purchases to a new merchant, unusually large payment amounts, international transactions, and transactions from high fraud zip codes can all cause legitimate transactions to be declined.
ACH Payment Failures
When it comes to ACH (bank account) payments, the rate of failed payments is significantly reduced. Typically the only time a payment fails on ACH is because there are insufficient funds in the account, an incorrect routing/account number has been entered, or the account has been closed.
If you're trying to pay with a brokerage account and you don't have debits enabled OR if you're using a savings account, it will result in a failure as well.