Of course, I know it has to be a prepaid booking. But I've never seen charges post immediately. They always first show up as pending and depending on the merchant will pay between 1 and 3 days later usually with the date the charge was made. Ideally it should work exactly the way emcampbe described above.

I can attest to that because 2 years ago in 2023 I made a booking on the last day of the year and the credit came out of the 2023 bucket because the charge posted with a 12/31 date of that year.

However, in the past I have seen complaints here and there from other members where the charge posted with a 1/1 date and the credit came out of the new year's bucket. So that's why I said it can go either way. Have seen the same complaints with monthly, quarterly, or bi-annual credits where they were attempted to be used on the last day of the period and the charge posted in the new period with the credit coming out of the new bucket. That's why, if possible, it is advisable not to wait until the last day to use any credits to avoid this issue.