When a credit card is ‘swiped’ for authorization the money is temporarily ‘held’ by your bank until the transaction is finalized. Restaurants differ from most establishments in that the amount that is authorized is not the amount that will be finalized. This is because of the cultural practice of tipping servers.
So… What many restaurants do to remedy this is to ad a percentage to the authorized amount. For example, if the transaction total is $25.00, the credit card may be authorized for $30.00.
The Vanilla Bean Café finalizes all of its credit card transactions at 3:05 am each day. The amount that is indicated on your register receipt is the amount that will be charged to your credit card. The amount of the authorization may be 'held' from 1 - 7 days depending on the practices of your credit card provider.
The Vanilla Bean Café's register system automaticly adds 10% to the check total for authorization . This is to prevent us from getting an additional authorization charge in the event of a tip. Even though tipping is not a common practice in the segment of the industry called fast-casual (of which The Vanilla Bean Café is part), there are some people who do leave a tip on their credit card.
Credit card fees are high enought without taking on additional transaction fees that can be avoided.
If you have further questions please email us at:
The Vanilla Bean Café Management
