When customers can't complete their order, it can impact your business and create frustration. Understanding why transactions are declined can help you to support your customers more effectively.
Reasons for declines
Several factors can cause a customer's payment to be declined. Here are the most common reasons:
Card-related issues
The customer's card itself might be the problem. This can happen when:
- The customer doesn't have enough funds in their account or has reached their credit limit.
- The card has expired, or the customer entered incorrect details.
- The customer's bank has blocked the card for security reasons.
- The customer entered the wrong security code or billing address.
Security measures
Banks and payment processors use sophisticated systems to protect customers from fraud. A transaction might be declined if:
- The customer is making a purchase that doesn't match their normal spending patterns.
- The customer is attempting an international transaction but hasn't enabled this feature.
- The 3-D Secure authentication process fails.
Technical issues
Sometimes the problem isn't with the customer's card or account. Technical issues can include:
- Network connectivity problems between systems.
- Temporary downtime with the payment processor.
Helping your customers
When a customer's payment is declined, providing clear guidance helps them resolve the issue quickly and reduces support enquiries.
Help customers resolve issues independently
Since most declined transactions stem from card or bank issues, clear communication helps customers resolve problems themselves without contacting your support team:
- On your checkout, display specific, actionable error messages instead of generic "payment failed" notifications. For example, "Your card has declined".
- Make it easy for customers to retry their payment or switch to alternative payment methods with prominent buttons or links.
Check the basics
Advise customers to verify their card details before trying again:
- Check their card number, expiry date, and security code are accurate.
- Ensure their billing address matches what their bank has in their records.
- Confirm their card hasn't expired.
Contact their bank
Suggest customers contact their bank to resolve account-related issues:
- Confirm their card is active and working.
- Check they have sufficient funds or available credit.
- Ask if the bank has blocked any transactions for security reasons.
- Verify there are no spending limits affecting their purchase.
Try alternative solutions
If the problem persists, customers can:
- Use a different payment method if they have one available.
- Contact your customer support team for assistance.
- Wait a few minutes and try again, as temporary technical issues often resolve themselves.
When you should step in
Some decline patterns can indicate issues in the wider payment network rather than customer-specific problems. You should investigate further if:
- Multiple customers report identical decline issues within a short timeframe.
- Your overall decline rate has increased significantly compared to normal levels.
- Customers receive unclear or generic error messages that don't explain the problem.
- The same customer experiences declines across different payment methods.
Troubleshooting issues with declines
- Start by following the guidance above to rule out issues that are specific to a customer or their card.
- Look for patterns across multiple declined transactions. Check if declines are affecting specific card schemes (Visa, Mastercard), cards from particular countries, or transactions above certain amounts.
- If you are using a Webservices API integration, review the acquirerresponsecode and acquirerresponsemessage fields in your AUTH and REFUND responses for declined transactions. These can provide specific details from the acquiring bank about why transactions failed. In particular, look out for multiple declines that share the same response codes.
The acquirer response details can also be viewed in Portal.
- Check your decline rates over the past 24-48 hours. A sudden spike in declines across different customers often indicates a technical issue rather than individual card problems.
You can use the Dashboard in Portal to check your decline rates.
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Contact our Support Team if you identify concerning patterns or need assistance. Please provide:
- Transaction references of affected transactions.
- Details on any patterns you've identified.
- Acquirer response codes you're seeing.
- Timeframe when the issues started.
