Paid by Pix but the order is still pending: what to do

When you have paid by Pix (the instant payment system run by Banco Central do Brasil, Brazil's central bank) and the order is still pending, the first thing to check is the payee on the receipt. If the name and the CNPJ (Brazil's company registration number) belong to the store or its payment intermediary, the money arrived and only the confirmation is missing. If the payee is someone else, the code you paid may have been altered, and the path is to dispute it with your bank.

What to look at on the receipt

Open the receipt in your banking app and note four details:

• Status. Completed, processing or scheduled.
• Payee. Name, part of the ID number and institution.
• Amount and date.
• Transaction ID. A long code that usually starts with the letter E. The store uses it to find your payment.

With that in hand, you can tell which of the five causes below is yours.

The five most common causes

1. The store has not received the confirmation yet

Pix takes seconds, but the notice from the payment provider to the store's system sometimes runs late or fails. The money is in the account, and the order doesn't know it.

How to recognize it: the receipt is completed and the payee is the store or its intermediary.

What to do: send the receipt and the transaction ID through the site's customer service channel. The store can approve the order manually.

2. You paid a different charge

If you generate the QR code twice, reload the page or place two orders, you may end up paying the code for a different order than the one you are looking at.

How to recognize it: the amount or the description on the receipt matches another order.

What to do: give the store both order numbers. It can link the payment to the right order or refund the difference.

3. The amount doesn't match

If you paid by typing the store's key, and not through the QR code, an amount different from the order total prevents automatic approval.

How to recognize it: the receipt shows an amount different from the order total.

What to do: talk to the store. It can approve the order, charge the difference or refund the amount.

4. The payment is under review

Banco Central do Brasil allows banks to hold a Pix for a while for a security review, and allows the recipient's institution to place a precautionary block when it suspects fraud. It is rare in ordinary purchases, but it happens.

How to recognize it: the receipt is in processing, or the bank sends a notice asking for confirmation.

What to do: wait for the period the bank gives you and follow it in the app. If in doubt, contact your bank's support.

5. The money went to another account

This is the most worrying cause. Malicious code on the store's page, a program on your device or a fake message swapped the QR code or the Pix Copia e Cola code (the text version of the payment code that the customer copies and pastes into their banking app), keeping the amount. In September 2026, Kaspersky confirmed 90 Brazilian online stores with code that made this swap at checkout. For merchants, the symptom was exactly this: pending orders.

How to recognize it: the receipt is completed and the payee has no connection to the store.

What to do:

1. Use the Contestar Pix (Dispute Pix) option in your banking app and report scam or fraud.
2. Do it the same day. The deadline is 80 days, but a refund depends on there being a balance in the receiving accounts.
3. Tell the store and send the receipt. It needs to fix the page so other customers don't fall for the same scam.
4. Keep screenshots, the receipt, the order number and the bank's case number.

The full step-by-step is in wrong Pix payment online: mistake or scam.

How long to wait before contacting the store

Pix is usually confirmed in seconds. If the receipt is completed and the order is still pending after an hour, it is worth sending a message. If the payee is someone else, don't wait: dispute it with your bank right away and only then talk to the store.

What not to do

• Don't pay again before you understand what happened.
• Don't accept a QR code or a key sent by message, even if it claims to be from the store, to "sort out" the order.
• Don't share your password or a verification code with anyone who says they are fixing the case.

For merchants

A pending order with a paid Pix is one of the first signs of a QR code swapped on the page. If several customers send receipts in another company's name, treat it as an incident and follow the playbook for when the customer paid by Pix and the order was not confirmed. Proteside checks, on the payer's screen, whether the QR code and the Copia e Cola code are the ones the store issued, blocks the swap before confirmation and alerts the store. See Pix protection at checkout.