The goal of authorization analysis is to turn declined authorizations into successful sales. Merchants use the Authorization Analysis report to analyze decline reasons so that they may evaluate business operations that could lead to increased approval rates. Using authorization analysis, merchants can manage authorization recycling programs. Authorization declines are typically categorized as “hard” permanent states that will not change or “soft” temporary situations that may change over time. An example of a hard decline would be lost-stolen or account closed, whereas a soft decline would be over-credit limit or late payment. Soft declines are temporary, and merchants are often successful in obtaining approvals after re-trying soft declines multiple times over a short period.