I’ve experienced a similar thing at the local pool/snooker hall. Not with Apple Pay, but I’m sure it makes little difference.
Slightly different though, I got the notification on Monzo that the transaction had gone through, but the owner accidentally hit the cancel button on the terminal before it fully completed.
Obviously I told him it appears to have gone through but was happy to go with whatever his receipt said (cancelled) on the assumption that, like most banks, it would reconcile in 3-5 working days.
To my surprise, before the second transaction went through, the first refunded.
So, I believe, it’s just a side effect of the awesomeness of Monzo.
Not sure why it declined on your side the first time, but the whole auth/reconcile/refund process is definitely a refreshing change from legacy banks.
I remember back in the day something similar happening to me in Tesco. Money was certainly not abundant for me at the time and I effectively lost £40 out of my account for the best part of a week. Tesco couldn’t help, NatWest couldn’t help, I just had to wait.
I may also have run into this issue - Apple Pay with Monzo didn’t work but contactless using the Monzo card did, I can’t remember for sure, but I think it was a WorldPay terminal…
Yes, I definitely remember the word cancelled appearing when trying to use Apple Pay, so it sounds like exactly the same issue. Perhaps I’ll have to give Starling a go tomorrow to be sure!
Great that Monzo has finally landed Apple Pay! Why is it necessary to ask for a SMS verification code though? Surely your Touch ID or monzo pin would be sufficient.
I also use Starling in-app provisioning Of Apple Pay and it doesn’t ask for a SMS verification code, so it feels more simple to be honest.
They want to defend against a stolen/compromised device where the app is still logged in but SIM has been removed/cancelled. Not perfect by any means (SMS can be intercepted through other means) but better than nothing.
