It sort of dawned on me what is happening that is different than other authorizations.
Typically, when you get an authorization, say for a meal out, they send an authorization for the amount to be sure you have funds when you turn your credit card over to the server. The credit card company assigns an identifier code to this (I can see this on the credit card processing software we use here at work) Then, that exact transaction is turned in to an approved charge later that night when the business sends all their final charges over (my software calls it closing the daily transactions). So they never show as 2 transactions, only 1. The amount charged will change if you've added a tip in but it's still all one single identifier code.
At Disney they are sending in a preauthorization to be sure the funds are there but instead of that exact transaction turning in to an approved charge, they send a different transaction over as a new charge. Leaving both to show up on the account. I can only guess it's because the amounts vary so much. Even if they want to be sure the funds remain available there's got to be a better way to do that vs. a new transaction. I realize they need to leave the initial authorization there, so that the guest doesn't have $2000 (for example) available upon arrival but while at Disney spend it on something else so when Disney tries to send the final charge, the funds are no longer available. Example, someone could arrive at Disney, have plenty of available credit but then purchase something big like a TV online and spend half of that, leaving too little available credit for Disney. Disney needs to be sure that full amount remains available. So that I get. But I don't follow why they are processing them as they are. Or why they won't just go ahead and run the room balance upon arrival like they used to. The room balance is often the bulk of that total and if they just got it in advance, that would leave a lot less tied up in limbo.
Hopefully some of that makes a bit of sense. It's as hard to explain as it is to understand.