Retry failed ARB payments

[nadermx]

Hello,

I currently am trying, just like stripe.com and paypal do, to have authorize retry failed payments before the next subscription payment date.

I saw that recently authorize now offers Automatic Retry Recurring Billing, unfortunatly this does not actually do what it says it does.

Instead this says that I have to update the card for it to not terminate.  That is clearly not "automatic" and it clearly does not "retry" failed payments.

Given that I have had my card declined randomly in my life enough times for no reason and works later in the day or another day with me not having to add more money or update my credit card information, I know that this is a common problem.

What I would like to do instead is have if a ARB fails for WHATEVER reason, for it to retry it 1-3 times (as I have stated previously that clearly stripe and paypal do) before the next subscription payment due date and if those fail then terminate as it does now. 

How would I go about doing this?  Clearly I have to either do this manually or write a script using the API.  If I have to write a script using the API to do this, what would I do?

[Anurag]

Hi @nadermx

Thanks for your feedback .  Currently we do want the merchant to manually update the subscription so any errors caused by having an invalid or expired card can be corrected  before the next retry . 

You are welcome to post this as a new feature using  Ideas forum at   http://community.developer.authorize.net/t5/Ideas/idb-p/ideas. 

This will allow others to vote on and make suggestions to improve the request.

[brianmc]

Thanks for the feedback and we'll definitely be considering this as we introduce significant recurring billing updates in 2018.  You're correct about general declines being unpredictable but with this feature we wanted to address the much more common scenario where a card has expired, been reissued, closed, etc.  

Brian

[nadermx]

But why would you then call it what it is not?  Any idea when this will be implimented? I can't imagine this not being a high priority as it would increase authorize's revenue, probably by a noticeable amount as it would increase the number of transactions

[brianmc]

Can't give firm dates but we are planning a steady stream of enhancements to recurring in 2018, you could certainly expect to see it by the middle of the year.  Perhaps surprisingly, in recurring we see many more declines that we know will keep declining than the type you see when using your card for one-off purchases where it may work at one store but not the next, or decline one day but approve the next day.   That being said this is still a very valid use case and we definitely have this feature in our 2018 roadmap.  Thanks again for the feedback.

As for the name, I completely understand the confusion this caused and apologize for that.  I can only refer to the old joke about the 3 hardest problems in Computer Science: 1. Naming things and 2. Off by 1 errors :-)

Happy New Year,

Brian