Pending payment / payment authorisation
Occasionally a purchase attempt on our site will not complete, you will see an error message and you will not receive an order confirmation email. In this instance there may be an authorisation on your card or Paypal account, for this order attempt. We have not captured the payment and the authorisation will be cancelled automatically and the funds will be released back to your card/Paypal account. It may take a few days depending on how quickly your bank processes this.
A further explanation on what a preauthorisation is can be found below.
A Preauthorisation / pending transaction (also card authorisation, preauthorisation, or preauth) is the practice within the banking industry of authorising electronic transactions done with a debit card or credit card and holding this balance as unavailable either until the merchant clears the transaction (also called settlement), or the hold "falls off." In the case of debit cards, authorisation holds can fall off the account (thus rendering the balance available again) anywhere from 1–8 business days depending on the issuing bank.