Apple stole my money?

Question

I recently put in an order for a 15" MBP on the australian store. I didn't hear anything from apple for days after my confirmation email until yesterday, my expected delivery day. I was told I needed to contact my creditcard company because apple kept getting denied.
When I called my cc company they told me that they already authorised a $3000 transaction from apple and denied a $782 because there wasn't enough money on the account(it's a prepaid visa). The total cost of my order was $3081 which they already took. Why try and take an extra $800? I called apple to see what was going on at their end and the person from apple that I spoke to didn't know why they did this, but it doesn't appear like they have my money. I was told he would contact the billing department and get back to me, but that was hours ago.
What is apple doing with my money? Has anyone had any troubles with them like this? And how long did it take for it to be resolved? It is very frustrating as I am without a computer at the moment and was expected to have it delievered by now.

Answer 1

Multiple "authorizations" are quite common. I've had this happen many times... from Apple... PCMall... and even recently with Beerofthemonthclub.com. It's not always clear why it happens. I know with the last one... I had placed an order for something that was about $300 but the shipping was going to be another $120. They authorized the $300 and a separate authorization for the full price of $420. I have yet to encounter a situation where both charges actually post. I believe a retailer has something like 3 (although it may be 5) days to actually post a charge after they authorize it. The authorization just "reserves" the funds... they haven't actually taken it at that point. It can be a real pain sometimes... especially if you're using a debit or pre-paid card... as you're basically out of that cash until the charge posts. You can sometimes work it out between the retailer and your bank... but the retailer needs to actually contact your bank in order to clear the extra authorization... otherwise, you just need to wait those few days for it to automatically be corrected.