Your payment history is a cap table once you read it that way

Everything on this desk is derivable from two lists a reader already has: what arrived and on which rail, and what was sent back. Building the table takes a few minutes and answers the questions that a support queue answers slowly.

Rail stub

Column 1: the rail
Column 2: paid in, less returned
Column 3: the cap
Column 4: its state

the railA payment method that has carried a completed deposit - not a method saved on the account

the capWhat a rail paid in, less what it has already returned, and never below zero

released moneyThe part of a balance above every cap: payable, and travelling by the operator’s own route

Direct answerRead the payment history by rail rather than by date. Each rail has a running total of what it paid in and what it has been paid back; the difference is its cap, and the sum of the caps is the amount the next withdrawal can move without any released money being involved.

The four columns

Which rail a line belongs to is the only judgement the exercise needs. Deposits and withdrawals on the same rail belong in the same row, and everything else follows mechanically.

A reader’s own table, built from five history lineshistory 12 Aug card deposit 200.00 14 Aug bank deposit 240.00 19 Aug card reversal - 50.00 (a disputed charge, reversed) 02 Sep bank withdrawal 90.00 03 Sep e-wallet deposit 120.00 the table rail paid in returned cap state card 150.00 0.00 150.00 open (200.00 less a 50.00 reversal) bank 240.00 90.00 150.00 open e-wallet 120.00 0.00 120.00 open total 510.00 90.00 420.00 3 rails, 420.00 of cap next withdrawal 500.00 requested -> 420.00 looped + 80.00 released, 3 payments 300.00 requested -> 300.00 looped + 0.00 released, 3 payments

Two things in that table are easy to get wrong without reading carefully. The 50.00 reversal reduces the card’s paid-in figure, so the card’s cap is 150.00 rather than the 200.00 of the original deposit - a reversed payment is a payment that never stayed. And the bank’s cap is 150.00 rather than 240.00, because 90.00 has already gone back out on that rail. The caps are running balances, and the history shows every movement that changes them.

Labelling the rails

The cap is the arithmetic; the label is the judgement. Five labels cover what a reader will find.

Open

Positive cap and the rail works. The default and the useful state. An open rail does not need a test deposit and does not need a support ticket.

Spent

Cap at zero because it has all been returned. The rail is finished until a new deposit on it completes. A spent rail is not a closed rail, and the distinction matters when planning.

Dead

Positive cap, and the destination no longer exists. The money is not lost and not moving. Re-route, hold or leave it alone, and note the fee if a re-route is needed.

Frozen

Positive cap, working destination, and a name or payer check that has not been cleared. The freeze is on this rail only, and the rest of the table keeps working.

The fifth label is untested: a destination the reader intends to use that has no completed deposit behind it. Its cap is 0.00, and the only way to change that is to pay in and wait for the deposit to settle - which is the subject of the test-deposit page and the reason a plan that depends on a brand-new destination has to start a day or two earlier than expected.

Do the table before a large withdrawal, not after. Its value is predictive: it says how many payments to expect, which rail closes, and whether any part of the balance is released money with no rail behind it. A reader who has the table can tell a slow payment from a missing one, which is the difference between waiting and opening a dispute.

What the table will not tell you

Two things live outside it, and both are worth knowing before relying on the arithmetic.

The order the rails are tried in

The table gives the rails and the caps, not the sequence. The sequence is in the withdrawal terms, and it decides which rail is retired first - so two readers with identical tables can end up with different rails spent after the same withdrawal.

The rule used to divide the request

A waterfall and a proportional rule produce the same total and different payments. The table predicts the total either way; the number of credits and the amounts need the rule, which is page six of this desk.