“Payer needs to perform the following action before proceeding with payment”

Hi @rev4,

This error means the payment process was restarted, likely because the user was overcharged.
For example, when the buyer pre-authorizes a payments via the express buttons but then adds additional products to their cart before completing the order.
The pre-authorization only covers a little bit over the authorized amount to anticipate taxes and shipping: https://woocommerce.com/document/woocommerce-paypal-payments/#paypal-on-non-checkout-pages

In that case, there will first be a failed order, but the payment process is restarted, so the buyer can again confirm the payment with the updated amounts.
If completed, the order will update from Failed to Processing. Otherwise, if the buyer does not complete the process, the order remains in the Failed status.

Kind regards,
Niklas

Thanks for your answer.

Is it possible to customer has just abandoned the sale at the point of PayPal?

Hi @rev4,

Yes, the buyer can cancel the payment process at any time before the amount has been fully authorized or captured.
So in this example, the buyer can cancel the payment process at any time before the last step:
Buyer clicks PayPal button on single product page for a 10€ product. Buyer pre-authorized the 10€ payment and is forwarded to the (prefilled) Checkout page.
Instead of confirming the order, the buyer navigates back to the Shop and adds three more products to the cart.
Upon clicking the “Place order” button on the Checkout page, the failed order would be created (because the user is overcharged) and the buyer is forwarded to the PayPal site with the updated order totals.
The buyer has to confirm the new payment at PayPal before the order would be Processing/Completed.
When the buyer cancels the payment process, the Failed order would remain in the system.

Kind regards,
Niklas