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  1. Payment on your order has failed.
  2. Payment for your order has failed.
  3. Payment of your order has failed.
  4. Your order payment has failed.

I prefer 1st, but which one is correct for error message in online store?

EDIT:

All 4 sentences seem to be grammatically accurate, so the question is about which of them is more common.

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1 Answer 1

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I believe the first is more common in America, and to my mind has a more informal tone. The second would be more common in the UK, and is probably the most grammatically correct. The third is less common; the fourth needs a possessive, and it isn't a common collocation in this circumstance.

Although I don't think any of them is technically incorrect, I'd favour number 2.

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    I'm in the US, and I'd favor #2 as well (although #1 would be okay grammatically). I might also suggest starting off with an article: The payment for your order has failed. Though not necessary, I think it helps the sentence flow better.
    – J.R.
    Commented Sep 24, 2013 at 12:59
  • "Payment on your order" brings 739,000 search results in Google, "Payment for your order" - 13,600,000. #2 is more common; ended with "Unfortunately, payment for your order has failed." Commented Sep 24, 2013 at 15:36
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    Quite honestly, as a user I would like much more explicit feedback on why it failed- There was an error validating your credit card. A connection to the credit card authorization service could not be established. Your session timed out. Whatever, but telling me my payment failed and giving me no information about why, leaves me feeling frustrated and with a need to call someone to find out why.
    – Jim
    Commented Sep 25, 2013 at 2:57
  • @Jim, yes, but that's off topic as far as the forum is concerned. Commented Sep 27, 2013 at 15:28
  • Jim, don't worry, more explicit feedback goes right after "Unfortunately, payment for your order has failed." Commented Sep 28, 2013 at 12:23

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