I paid to UPS via paypal on 4 August. UPS initially blocked the amount which was showing as pending. On 17 August UPS took the money through paypal from my Monzo account, but Monzo considered it as a different transaction which was settled straight away. The initial charge is still showing as pending.
When I tried to speak with the support team, they treat it as a dispute and ask me to prove that the merchant (UPS) is not going to charge me. This is totally ridiculous given UPS charged correctly and PayPal recognised it as one transaction, so the issue is clearly on the Monzo side and there is no dispute with UPS and/or PayPal. However I’m stuck with the dispute team who still wants some kind of confirmation from UPS.
Any suggestions?
The pending payment transaction will disappear within a week (but can take up to a month I believe). Waiting is the easiest option, if you can. If not, unsure what proof you can provide.
Have you emailed UPS and asked them to confirm it won’t be collected?
Looks like they’ve done a new transaction rather than completing the first
Somehow PayPal recognised it correctly, you can see 4 August as a trade date and 17 August as a settlement date. I’m not sure what to ask from UPS given they charged my paypal account correctly.
It didn’t disappear within the week, as it’s now more than 2 weeks since 4 August. I can wait, it’s not that a big amount, but I would prefer Monzo fixing the bug as next time it might be a much bigger amount which can drive me to the overdraft.
It’s not a bug – it’s PayPal saying to Monzo
Hey, I need £X for Y reason, I’ll come get it later
(“Y reason” being the authorisation code)
Monzo then holds on to that money for PayPal
When UPS charged you through PayPal, for some reason instead of saying
Hey, can I get that money I told you about earlier?
PayPal actually said
Hey, can I also collect £X for W reason? I’ll take it now!
So Monzo is still holding the initial amount (for “Y”) because PayPal wasn’t clear with Monzo that they wanted to take the original (Y) amount and asked for a different amount (W) instead
Monzo are just doing what PayPal told them to do. And PayPal are just the middle man, they’re just telling Monzo all this on behalf of UPS
Any payment processing experts will be able to correct anything wrong I said
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It would have made sense if PayPal showed it as a separate transaction. But it clearly shows that this transaction was initiated on 4 August. If this wasn’t communicated to Monzo properly, it means there are issues in the communication channel between PayPal and Monzo, and someone at Monzo should probably take it directly with PayPal.
It’s not a bug, it’s how PayPal have handled the transaction.
Monzo don’t talk to PayPal during this process. Monzo (and any bank) just do what PayPal (or any merchant) tells them to do
In this case, it’s most likely that PayPal asked Monzo to hold an amount under one authorisation code and then claimed under a different one instead of using the original auth code
Monzo (or any other bank) would just see one authorisation and one separate auth+claim.
If PayPal see it correctly then it’s most likely they matched up the UPS>PayPal bit of the process and something went haywire when claiming the funds from Monzo
This is just speculation based on my understanding of how payments are handled
You don’t get charged overdraft fees on pending transactions
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I just moved funds from my account so the balance is -£15 (including this £30 pending transaction), and monzo started showing overdraft charges (zero for now). So I don’t think your statement is accurate.
It will keep showing the overdraft fees as zero until the transaction is no longer pending
The balance deducts pending transactions but that’s not what the charges are based on
I dip into my overdraft regularly when I have income due the next day, easier than moving from pots. Never been charged
Unless they’ve changed something in that last 2 weeks and not told anyone
That’s good to know! I’ll leave it negative overnight just to doublecheck, but if that’s the case it makes the issue much less important.
Found a post by a former staff member confirming
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Just wait. It’ll rectify itself. No need to get all flustered and do so much work just to release it when it will happen eventually itself.
In my experience, that second screenshot is the confirmation - it’s two identical amounts, one pending from earlier in the month and one that’s cleared from more recently. Your screenshot shows the initial date which matches the payment on Monzo, and the cleared date, also matching Monzo. That should be all the confirmation that’s needed.
When I’ve had an issue (I think it was John Lewis, who held a couple of hundred quid for a purchase then made another transaction when the item was dispatched, a similar email was sufficient.
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