It is common in industries where a service is provided prior to the customer being charged, for the bank to put a temporary hold on an estimated amount of funds in your account. These holds are sometimes called preauthorizations, authorization holds, or credit holds. If you aren’t familiar with this practice, it may look like GoShare is double charging you. This is not the case. What you are seeing is a temporary hold on your account to reserve funds and ensure you don’t overdraw.
What is a temporary hold?
When a hold is put on your account, the bank temporarily reserves funds for an expected future payment. The funds are never removed from your account. An estimated amount is temporarily “held” back from account funds available for spending. This ensures that when your card is billed, there is enough money in the account to handle the transactions.
Why does GoShare use temporary holds?
Temporary holds protect our delivery professionals and our customers. They ensure that when you are billed, there is enough money to cover the transaction. This helps prevent declined payments, which can hurt your credit score. This also helps GoShare prevent fraudulent uses of our services by those who would hire delivery professionals without the intent to reimburse them for their time and labor.
When is the hold removed?
GoShare releases the hold immediately upon payment of the final bill or upon cancellation of the project. While most card issuers release the funds within minutes of the hold being release, some banks may delay releasing funds for one to two business days. Unfortunately, this is at the discretion of the card issuer and GoShare is not able to influence how quickly they release the funds for use after the hold is lifted.
How common are temporary holds?
Placing a hold on credit cards is a common practice by companies that provide goods and services before issuing a bill or charge, such as hotels, car rentals, and gas stations. For example, hotels will place a hold on your card 24-hours before your stay to cover estimated room costs. Gas stations place a hold on your card for an estimated amount (often on the high-end of what someone might spend) before you begin pumping, to help prevent gasoline theft. Only after you finish pumping and the final amount is known does the gas station bill your card.
Additional questions?
If you have additional questions on this topic or a GoShare project, please don’t hesitate to contact us.