Transactions and refunds

Where: Payments, and per participant in Participants

Every payment made against your event, and what to do when one has to be reversed.

Reading a transaction

Only Successful is money. Pending looks like a registration in nearly every other respect, which is why revenue figures that include it never reconcile.

Each transaction records what was paid, by whom, for what, and its status.

Statuses you will see:

• Successful — the money moved. This is the only status that counts as revenue.
• Pending — started, not completed. Common with bank-redirect methods. Some resolve on their own; others never do.
• Failed — did not complete. The participant was not charged.
• Refunded — reversed after having succeeded.

What a payment covers

A single payment may include an entry fee, merchandise and shipping together. Reading the line detail matters when reconciling, because the total against a participant is not necessarily their entry fee.

Merchandise lines are itemised separately, which is what lets you refund one item without unwinding the whole registration.

Refunds

Refund through the platform, not directly in your payment provider.

Refunding at the provider moves the money but leaves the platform believing the participant still paid. Your records then disagree with your bank, and nothing here will tell you — you find out at reconciliation, weeks later.

Refunding a merchandise line

Removing a purchased item marks that line refunded. It does not delete it.

That is deliberate and worth understanding: the purchase happened, your provider has a record of it, and a deleted row would make the two permanently irreconcilable. The refunded line is the honest record.

Never resolve a payment problem by deleting a record

Deleting a participant or an order line does not return anyone's money. It removes your own evidence of a transaction your payment provider still holds. Refund first; then decide whether anything needs removing at all.

Reconciling

At the end of an event, your platform total and your provider total should agree.

If they do not, check in this order:

1. Pending payments counted as revenue. The most common cause.
2. Refunds issued at the provider rather than here.
3. A credential switch mid-event — money split across two accounts. See Payment gateway.
4. Provider fees, which are deducted at their end and are not visible here.

Chargebacks

If a participant disputes a charge with their bank, that happens entirely at your provider. The platform will not know. Resolve it there, then refund here if the dispute succeeds, so the two records agree again.