I'm looking for a payment proceessor which accepts credit cards and also supports deferred processing. To be clear my ideal workflow is:
Please one site per answer so the best ones can be voted up!
Authorize.Net allows you to perform an AUTH_ONLY which allows you to freeze the funds on a user's card. Then when you are ready to capture payment you do a PRIOR_AUTH_CAPTURE indicating the transaction ID to receive the frozen funds. The user's credit card is not needed for the second part.
They also offer the CIM API which let's you create payment profiles for your customers. Then you can charge their card whenever you want without the customer's card being present.
authorize.net is a popular payment gateway. I'm not sure if this is what you mean, but take a look at the CC Transaction Types.
You should be able to place a "hold" on an amount of money.
The transaction is approved and the money is taken off the card holders available balance, but no actual transfer takes place.
At some later time you can either execute or cancel the "hold". If you do nothing the hold will be released after some time (days) has elapsed.
You will need a prior agreement with your "merchant acquirer" -- i.e. your bank -- in order to execute these transactions.
This is the mechanism used by care hire companies to make sure you can pay the rental and any damages when you return the car, and, hotels to make sure they get paid if you decide on "death by minibar".
