FlyerTalk Forums - One dollar charges on CC

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- - One dollar charges on CC (https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/united-airlines-mileageplus/1367554-one-dollar-charges-cc.html)

Quote:

Originally Posted by drowelf (Post 18951336)

Another factor I believe might be working here is the 24-hour cancellation policy. I've noticed that my actual tickets charges tend to appear after the 24 hour window. If they do the $1 charge first, that validates that the card is good and then after the 24 hour window the actual charge gets applied. That way then don't have to get into the Chargeback processing loop. Everybody hates chargebacks, both merchants and processors and anything to reduce those is probably saves $$ at both ends.

Cheers,

Haven't done a 24 hour cancel since 3/3. But I have bought tickets, and haven't seen a $1 authorization - just the auth for the ticket amount. And pre-merger, UA would authorize and charge for the ticket, even when it hadn't cleared by the time one cancelled (IME, anyway) and would just do a refund. Delta, in my experience, did the same thing. I'm not an expert on the CC processing process, but in terms of fees, I believe the merchant doesn't get charged a fee (or gets it back) if a charge is refunded to a customer.

Quote:

Originally Posted by sbm12 (Post 18951542)

They auth when you purchase. They bulk process the actual purchases generally later. They do this to reduce their processing costs and improve systems performance as I understand it. If you leverage the 24 hour rule and cancel before they do the actual charge then they save money. And they don't lose any by processing a few hours after the purchase.

Do you have any evidence that they're actually paying double? I highly doubt that is actually the case.

There are fees for each authorization transaction. The $1 auth is one and the separate ticket charge is another. If COdbaUA is not paying those fees, it means their acquiring bank is paying them for them. That seems highly unlikely.

You also have to put a credit card in your profile in order to use it. Adding that card to your profile will give you the $1 auth as well.

It's a poor design to require a card in your profile in order to use it. It's also a poor design not to ticket immediately.

Every time I buy a DL ticket, I'm reminded how simple this stuff can be.