Why do I see a charge but my item hasn't shipped?

When you purchase from Books-A-Million, you may receive a notification from your bank about a charge from us.  Books-A-Million may apply a temporary authorization hold for the value of your order in advance, which will appear as a pending charge in your account’s payment method. This is standard e-commerce practice to ensure the card has sufficient funds.  This doesn’t result in a duplicate charge on your card.

This preauthorization is released after the appropriate timeframe and will no longer appear in your account.

You are only charged when your items ship (or are picked up in-store). If your order ships in multiple packages, you'll see separate charges for each shipment.

If your order is canceled before shipping, the temporary hold will usually disappear within 7–10 business days. If it doesn’t, please contact your financial institution. 

Credit card adjustments might not show until your next statement.

Gift/Reward Cards: Any unused funds are returned to the original card. If you no longer have it, let us know—we can issue a replacement.  (Email support@booksamillon.com). 

PayPal: Holds can take up to 30 days to clear. Please contact PayPal directly if it takes longer.

Affirm: If your order wasn't processed, your down payment wasn’t either. You might see a temporary hold, which usually disappears within 7–10 business days. Since the charge never went through, there’s no refund—just a release of the hold.

• If you have an issue with a confirmed refund from Affirm that hasn’t shown up on your account, please click get a refund
• To contact Affirm, please click here
• To check out the Affirm Help Center here.