Discogs will automatically set an order status to Payment Pending when a buyer has sent payment, but the payment does not clear right away. Typically, this is the result of a PayPal eCheck. An eCheck is an electronic payment funded by the buyer’s bank account. It usually takes up to 6 business days for an eCheck to clear and the money to appear in the recipient’s PayPal account. We advise our sellers to wait until the pending payment has cleared before shipping the order. That said, if PayPal is advising you to ship the item first in order to clear payment, you may need to follow their guidance instead.
When the payment clears, Discogs will automatically update the order to “Payment Received”. The seller can then proceed with fulfilling the order as they normally would. If you need more information about the different order status, please visit What Do The Different Order Statuses Mean?
If the buyer didn’t pay with eCheck and the status is still pending, we recommend checking with PayPal. They may place a hold or restrict account activity if they require more information from you about a transaction and this process can take up to 21 days.
Sellers may be able to release the payment before 21 days via the following options:
- Print a USPS or UPS shipping label from their PayPal account. This will automatically update the tracking information and delivery confirmation.
- Upload a supported carrier’s tracking number. PayPal will release the payment within three days of the carrier confirming delivery.
For more information on how to release held payments, please visit PayPal's support page.
An order may also be stuck in Payment Pending due to settings within a seller's PayPal account. To confirm if this is the case, log in to your PayPal account, click the gear on the top right and click Account Settings. Under "Managing risk and fraud", check your filter settings. These options allow you to require a manual review of transactions based on certain criteria. Under "Block payments", look to see which currencies you accept. Specifically, you may see an option titled "Allow payments sent to me in a currency I do not hold". This can be set to "Yes, accept and convert them to [your currency of choice]".
Note: It is not possible to merge two orders together that are in a Payment Pending status. Only orders in Invoice Sent can be merged