HOLD as Internal Credit

What is a "HOLD as Internal Credit?"
How do I do a hold if the original payment was a check?

The feature is used for two primary purposes.  First, to transfer money from one individual to another.  Second, to change a person's registration type after a payment has been made.

Definition of "HOLD as Internal Credit
The best way to think of a "HOLD for Internal Credit" is to consider it as "virtual" money.  Actual funds never move.  You're not giving people money, it's not a credit and recharge.  It is simply a "placeholder" type of money to give you a paper trail for the proper movement of money.     

A Type of Temporary Holding Fund
When issuing a refund, one of the listed options is a "HOLD as Internal Credit."  When selected, it creates a temporary "credit."  We are using the accounting term for a credit as constrasted to debit.  But don't get it confused into thinking that a refund is being issued to a credit card.  It is not.  What happens is the selected amount is simply placed ON HOLD and held until reclaiimed.  If you don't reclaim an On-Hold Internal Credit, it will show up as a warning on your validation check. In order for your tables to balance, you need to use this on HOLD CREDIT.

How do You Handle When Original Method Isn't Credit Card?
The question about how do you handle it if the original payment was a check is irrelevant. It doesn't matter what the original payment method was in the case of an HOLD for Internal Credit.  It could have been "clams" or "gold."  What you're doing in this step is taking a specific amount and putting it in a type of escrow or holding account for future use.  So even if the original was check, cash, credit card or clams, it doesn't matter.  You are now holding it in the currency of the site (e.g. dollars, euros, pounds, etc.) for future use.  When you later use it, you're using what you put in.

Using a Hold.
One of the biggest questions is how to apply a hold.  Because of needing to restrict the HOLD to only specific actions, the place you use (apply) a HOLD is under the "Multi-Person Payments."  It does NOT show up in the "Pay" section of the attendee listing.  This is intentional.  We don't want HOLDS showing up for cashiers to apply.  It requires the extra, specific step of going to that person's record in the  "Multi-Person Payments."  There is also another technical reason.  In some cases HOLDS require access to two people's records at once and that has to be done in multi-person payments. The standard single pay option from "Attendee Listing" doesn't work for that purpose.

There are additional guidelines related to the use of HOLD funds that are explained here.