Cambodia Visa Charged Twice or No Visa Received? What US Travelers Should Do

Charged but no visa received — where it actually is

The flip side of the duplicate scare is the silent one: your card cleared, the money is gone, and your inbox is empty. This is the case that makes travelers nervous because it feels like the payment vanished into nothing. It almost never has. Your Cambodia eVisa is delivered as a printable PDF by email, and the overwhelming majority of "I paid but got nothing" cases are a delivered approval sitting somewhere other than your main inbox.

Before you assume the worst, work through the obvious places in order. Check your spam or junk folder first — automated PDF attachments from an unfamiliar sender are exactly what aggressive filters quarantine. Then check the Promotions or Updates tab if you use Gmail, where travel and transactional mail often lands. Search your whole mailbox for "Cambodia," "eVisa," or "visa" rather than scrolling, because the approval may have arrived under a subject line you did not expect. Confirm the email address you typed at checkout had no typo — a single wrong character is the most common reason an approval never reaches an American applicant.

The other thing to remember is timing. Approval lands within 3 business days, and "business days" excludes weekends and US holidays. A payment made Friday evening is not late if the PDF has not arrived by Saturday morning — the clock has barely started. If you are inside the window, the answer is simply to wait. If you want to confirm where your application sits rather than guess, our walkthrough on how to check your Cambodia eVisa status shows you exactly where to look, and our guide on Cambodia eVisa processing time explains what the 3-business-day window does and does not include.

• Check spam and junk first — PDF approvals are the classic false-positive for email filters.
• Check the Promotions or Updates tab in Gmail, where transactional travel mail frequently lands.
• Search your whole mailbox for "Cambodia," "eVisa," or "visa" instead of scrolling your inbox.
• Re-read the email address you entered at checkout for a typo — one wrong character sends the PDF nowhere.
• Confirm you are still inside the 3-business-day window, counting only weekdays and skipping US holidays.

When it really is a duplicate — and how it gets fixed

Genuine double charges do happen, just far less often than the statement makes it look. The usual cause is human, not technical: a checkout page loads slowly, you assume the click did not register, and you submit again. Two complete payments go through, and now there are two real, settled charges rather than one charge plus a pending hold. The way to know it is real is the same test from earlier — if both lines are finalized and posted, neither is greyed out as pending, and several business days have passed without one dropping off, you are looking at a true duplicate.

If that is what you have, the fix is straightforward and you are never out of pocket for it. You are not billed twice for one approved Cambodia eVisa. A genuine second charge is reversed once it is confirmed, and you keep the single visa you actually applied for. The reversal posts back to the same card you paid with, on your bank’s normal refund timeline rather than instantly, which is worth knowing so the wait does not read as a second problem.

To get a real duplicate resolved quickly, reach out with the specifics in hand: both charge dates, both exact amounts, the email address you applied under, and the last four digits of the card. That lets the duplicate be matched and reversed without back-and-forth. Our team works US-timezone hours, so you are not waiting overnight for someone to pick up the thread. If you are also unsure whether a refund applies to your situation more broadly, our guide on Cambodia eVisa refunds and payment issues for Americans lays out what is reversible and what is not.

How to avoid a double charge in the first place

Almost every accidental duplicate traces back to the same moment: a page that took a few seconds longer than expected, and a second click that felt necessary but was not. The prevention is mostly patience plus a couple of small habits. Pay once, on one device, and wait for the confirmation screen to load fully before you do anything else. If the page is slow, give it a full thirty seconds before assuming it failed — the payment may already be processing behind the spinner.

A few practical habits keep the whole thing clean. Do not open the checkout in two browser tabs and do not switch from your phone to your laptop mid-payment — each open session can submit independently. If your card is declined, fix the decline rather than retrying blindly, because a real decline and a slow-loading success can look identical for a few seconds. And give your bank a heads-up that an international online charge is coming if your card tends to flag foreign transactions; our guide on clearing a Cambodia visa bank fraud hold covers exactly that, and it prevents the decline-then-retry loop that creates most duplicates.

It also helps to apply on a connection and a card you trust from the start. Use a secure network rather than open airport or cafe Wi-Fi, and confirm you are paying on the site you meant to use before you enter card details. Our guide on whether the Cambodia eVisa payment is safe walks through how Americans verify a checkout before paying, and if your card keeps getting refused, our fixes for a declined Cambodia visa card cover the bank-side settings that usually cause it.

• Pay once, on one device, and let the confirmation screen finish loading before doing anything.
• Give a slow page a full thirty seconds — the charge may be processing behind the spinner.
• Never open the checkout in two tabs or switch devices mid-payment; each session can submit on its own.
• If a card is declined, fix the decline before retrying — do not blindly resubmit.
• Tell your bank an international online charge is coming if your card flags foreign transactions.

Next steps and related reading for Americans: apply for your Cambodia eVisa on a single device and wait for the confirmation, see which payment methods work for US cards before you start, learn how to check your eVisa status if the PDF has not arrived yet, and review what is refundable in our Cambodia eVisa refunds guide.