Context

In the course of monitoring payments over the course of their lifecycle, you may notice that a transaction or payout status previously marked as COMPLETED has since transitioned to FAILED.

This can be surprising if you assumed that a "completed" state is terminal.

Answer

This is expected behavior. Completed states such as PAYOUT_COMPLETED are not terminal for ACH payments. ACH transactions can be returned (i.e., fail) days after they initially appear to have completed successfully.

Specifically:

• The overwhelming majority of ACH failures occur within two business days of the apparent completion.

• However, ACH payments can technically fail up to 60 days after a payment is completed.

Because of this, it is important that your system continues to monitor status changes even after a COMPLETED state is observed, and handles potential transitions to a failed state accordingly.

For more details, refer to the following resources:

• Returns (ACH Failures)

• Processing Windows & Settlement Timing

• Payment States & Events

• Payment Scenarios