Authorization holds on your selected payment method
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For some orders you place with IONOS, the invoice amount (plus a potential buffer) may be reserved on your chosen payment method. Similarly, you might notice a small charge of $1.00 for which there is no invoice. Both of these situations can give the impression of an unauthorized or double charge.
This article explains the background and why your chosen payment method will only be charged the actual final invoice amount.
Note
You can find out which payment methods are available to you in the Help Center article “Selecting a payment method”.
An authorization hold on your selected payment method
To ensure the security and efficiency of the IONOS payment system, transactions over $20 will place authorization holds on your chosen payment method. The reservation amount will be deducted from your available credit limit and cannot be used by you for the duration of the hold.
For higher-value transactions, reservations are set at a minimum of $5. If your balance is over $5, we may add up to a 20% buffer to the reservation (for example, a $10 fee becomes a $12 authorization hold).
Once the invoice has been generated and paid via your chosen payment method, this payment hold will be canceled. You only pay the final invoice amount once.
Payment method verification: pre-authorization ($1.00)
In addition to the reservation of the invoice amount, you may see a small charge of $1.00 from IONOS on your bank statement or credit card when you update your payment details. This is called a pre-authorization hold.
Why do we do this? This pre-authorization serves as a kind of bank deposit. It allows us to check the validity of your payment card and ensure that the payment method works. This ensures that your payment method is active and ready for immediate use.
What happens to the money? If you see this debit, don't worry: IONOS immediately bills and refunds this small amount as a standard validation step.
If you place multiple orders or update your payment details several times, IONOS may perform this check for each instance individually. Therefore, it's perfectly normal to see several of these small pre-authorizations on your statement.
Note
You will incur no additional costs for the authorization hold. You only pay the invoice amount for your selected product or service.
Releasing the authorization hold in the event of cancellation or end of trial
If you decide to cancel your order before invoicing or discontinue use during a 30-day free trial, the reserved amount will be automatically released within 28 days.
Please note that authorization holds are released immediately on our end, but it may take up to several weeks for the hold to be removed from your customer statement, depending on your bank. IONOS has no control over these processing times. Therefore, if you have any questions regarding a pending hold, please contact the customer service of your chosen financial institution directly.
Authorization hold not possible
If the provider of your payment method, e.g. your credit card issuer, declines the reservation, IONOS cannot process your order.
In this case, please double-check that all details are correctly entered. If the issue persists, we recommend contacting your payment provider to understand why the hold is being blocked, or simply restarting the purchase process with a new payment method.