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A failed agent task, a timed-out payment request, and an escrow lock failure are different events. A timeout can leave payment status uncertain; an escrow lock can still be processing; and an agent’s task result can fail even after funds were successfully locked. Check the payment provider’s idempotency rules and the escrow’s observable state before deciding whether to retry, refund, or resubmit.
First identify which operation failed
“FAIL” is not a universal payment or escrow state. Its meaning depends on the application that emits it. Do not assume it means a payment was declined, that no funds moved, or that a particular number of attempts has been used. The meaning of the label, attempt counting, lock behavior, and any attempt-cost model must be defined by the implementation.
Separate the workflow into three questions: did the agent complete its task, did the payment operation settle, and did escrow reach the required state? Those answers can differ.
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| Observed event | What it establishes | What to check next |
|---|---|---|
| The agent reports task failure | The application reports an unsuccessful task outcome. It does not by itself establish payment or escrow status. | Inspect the task result and separately query the payment and escrow records. |
| A payment request times out or returns an ambiguous response | The caller did not receive a definitive result. A timeout alone does not prove that the payment failed or that no charge occurred. | Use the same logical operation identity and follow the provider’s status, replay, or reconciliation procedure. |
| An escrow lock is pending or fails | Pending means the lock may still be processing; a failure means the system did not reach its required locked state, according to that system’s protocol. | Read the escrow or task state. Determine whether the system rolled back, needs a refund transaction, or permits reassignment. |
How to handle a payment timeout safely
A timeout describes what the caller observed, not necessarily what happened at the payment processor. The request may not have arrived, may still be processing, or may have completed while the response was lost. Treating every timeout as a failed payment and sending a new payment can create a duplicate; treating every timeout as success can leave an unpaid task.
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- Keep the logical operation identifiable. Record the provider’s transaction or idempotency identifier, the signed request payload, and the task or business action it belongs to.
- Check status using the provider’s documented method. Query the transaction or use its documented replay behavior before creating a new business action.
- Retry only under the provider’s contract. If the provider supports idempotency, a transport retry of the same action should use the same identity and payload. Do not assume every rail supports this or that every provider retains keys for the same period.
- Use a new identity only for a genuinely new action. A second intended payment is a new business operation; resending the original request because its response was lost is not.
- Reconcile before closing the task. Confirm the final payment and escrow states, not just the agent’s local error message.
What provider-specific idempotency can do
Formance describes deterministic idempotency keys that collapse retries, replays, and duplicate tool calls into one transaction. AsterPay documents a different, specific behavior: repeating an identifier with the same signed payload replays the original result without settling again, while reusing that identifier with a different payload returns a conflict. These examples illustrate provider contracts; they are not guarantees for all payment systems.
Before relying on idempotency, verify how the chosen provider treats an identical retry, a changed payload, concurrent requests, and an expired key. The available documentation examples do not establish a universal retention window or settlement guarantee.
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How to tell whether an escrow lock is pending or failed
Some systems lock funds synchronously; others acknowledge the request while an asynchronous worker attempts the lock. In Execution Market’s documented assignment flow, HTTP 202 Accepted with status: assigning means assignment and the associated lock are in progress. It is not a confirmed lock and is not a reason to repeat the assignment blindly. The documentation directs callers to poll GET /tasks/{id} or use assignment webhooks.
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|---|---|---|
assigning |
The asynchronous assignment lock is in progress. | Wait for a status update or webhook; do not submit the same assignment again just because the initial response was 202. |
accepted |
The lock succeeded. | Proceed according to the task workflow. |
published after a lock failure or timeout |
The assignment rolled back and the task is assignable again; applicants remain intact. | Confirm the final state before deciding whether to assign again or take another recovery action. |
These state meanings apply to the documented Execution Market flow, not to escrow products generally. A different service may expose different state names or recovery rules.
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When escrow locks—and why timing changes recovery
Execution Market documents two funding timings. In its default lock_on_assignment mode, funds stay in the agent’s wallet until a worker is assigned. In lock_on_creation mode, funds are locked earlier. The timing affects what cancellation means and whether a refund transaction is needed.
| Execution Market mode | When funds lock | Cancellation or expiry behavior in the documentation |
|---|---|---|
lock_on_assignment (default) |
At assignment, through an asynchronous lock process; publication alone does not move funds. | Canceling a published task is a no-op because funds were not locked. Canceling after assignment triggers an on-chain refund. If the task is never assigned before the authorization validity window expires, it expires without an on-chain refund. |
lock_on_creation |
When the task is created. | Canceling before assignment requires an on-chain refund. |
In the documented assignment flow, the publisher chooses a worker and signs an authorization bound to that worker. Because the receiver is included in the authorization nonce, the authorization must be created at assignment. This is another reason not to treat a lock retry as a generic repeat of the original publication step.
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Execution Market describes Solana separately: it uses direct SPL transfers rather than the escrow contract or its on-chain refund path. Do not apply the contract’s refund behavior to that route.
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What a different escrow lifecycle looks like
ERC-8183 is a protocol-design comparison, not evidence that a particular product uses that standard. It describes jobs progressing through Open, Funded, and Submitted states, followed by terminal Completed, Rejected, or Expired states. A client funds escrow, a provider submits work, and an evaluator—either the client or another designated evaluator—completes or rejects it. Rejected or expired work is refunded to the client.
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The distinction matters operationally: funded work is not necessarily submitted work, and submitted work is not necessarily approved or settled work. ERC-8183 also describes optional hooks for validation or side effects. Its specification says an after-hook runs in the same transaction and can revert the operation, preserving atomicity; it also identifies the refund after expiry as a recovery route that a hook cannot block. That lifecycle should not be mistaken for a universal escrow sequence.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.How to reason about attempt economics
There is no general retry-failure rate or universal cost per AI-agent attempt established here. An attempt-cost calculation must specify what counts as an attempt and which charges are included. A model execution, a tool call, a payment request, an escrow lock transaction, and a retry after an ambiguous response may each incur different costs.
- Agent work: compute or usage charges for generating, evaluating, or resubmitting work, if charged by the implementation.
- Payment processing: provider or network charges, where applicable. A repeated request may or may not incur a new charge; check the provider’s idempotency and fee rules.
- Escrow operations: lock, release, or refund transactions where the selected system and network use them.
- Locked capital: funds unavailable for other use while escrow remains locked. This is an economic effect, but its value depends on the amount, duration, and the user’s circumstances.
- Failure recovery: the cost and delay of waiting, reconciling, reassigning, or refunding. A rollback and a separate refund transaction are not the same recovery path.
Execution Market’s documentation, accessed in 2026, gives service-specific figures: a facilitator p95 of approximately 28 seconds with retries, in a discussion of a lock that may take one to two minutes; a platform fee of 1,300 basis points (13%); and a $100 deposit cap per task. Its worked example allocates a $0.10 bounty as $0.087 to the worker and $0.013 to the treasury. The documentation says the worker’s share does not shrink because of the described protocol fee; that fee is absorbed from the treasury share. These figures describe that service and documentation, not industry benchmarks or the cost of every failed attempt.
To estimate costs for another implementation, define the counted event first—for example, one submitted task, one payment operation, or one on-chain transaction—then apply only the fees and charges documented for that event. Do not multiply a service’s fee percentage by an assumed retry count unless the service actually charges that fee per retry.
Quick Recap
A practical recovery decision
- Task outcome uncertain? Read the task record and application-specific meaning of its failure label. Do not infer payment status from the agent’s result.
- Payment response uncertain? Look up the existing operation and follow the provider’s documented idempotency or replay behavior. Do not create a second payment merely to obtain a response.
- Lock still pending? Poll or wait for the documented webhook. Do not treat an asynchronous acknowledgement as a final failure.
- Lock definitively failed? Verify whether the system rolled back to an assignable state, requires an explicit refund, or needs another recovery procedure.
- Before another attempt, account for cost and identity. Reuse the same identity for a retry of the same logical payment when the provider contract requires it; create a new identity only for a distinct business action.
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