Transaction stuck for several months due to low fees

[KingsizeBlues]

Hi all

I have tried searching for this answer, but I couldn't find a clear solution to my problem, so I decided to make a post.

Around the time of the recent halvening, I paid a friend for some BTC. They use Electrum wallet, I do not. Neither of us have ever used Electrum wallet to send coins, they have only used it to receive BTC. They asked me what level of fees to set - foolishly, I said as low as possible. My wallet does not allow a choice of fees.

At the time, I did not understand that would mean no miners would process the transaction. I know that, technically, one day the fees could come down low enough for it to send. However in the meantime those coins are effectively unavailable to either me or my friend.

From the research I have done, it seems that the only solution for me to receive my coins is to make a new transaction with a higher fee. However, that does not return the stuck coins to my friend's wallet. As far as I can tell, those coins are now in limbo somewhere, leaving either them or me out of pocket. They are not prepared to send more coins without a clear explanation of how to get the first transaction cancelled (fair enough, it is a large amount of money at stake for both of us).

Is there a way to cancel this stuck transaction? Or I guess, how do we "unstick" those coins?

Thanks in advance for your help.

[Apocollapse]

Correct, that solution is called Child pays for parent (CPFP).

Which wallet you use? if your transaction support RBF, you can bump it using wallet that support it e.g. Electrum. Copy paste the TXID on mempool.space to know it.



There's no way to cancel Bitcoin transaction, it's either your friends make new transaction with higher fee, use third party acceleration service, or wait till the mempool empty.

If the size of your transaction is below ≤0.5 KB and the fee you paid ≥ 0.0001 BTC/KB you can use viabtc free accerelation https://www.viabtc.com/tools/txaccelerator

[promise444c5]

Correct, that solution is called Child pays for parent (CPFP).

There's no way to cancel Bitcoin transaction, it's either your friends make new transaction with higher fee, use third party acceleration service, or wait till the mempool empty.

Double-spend  can invalidate the transaction , since the friend did the transaction then they could just Double-spend it back to the friends wallet.

Is there a way to cancel this stuck transaction? Or I guess, how do we "unstick" those coins?

You can cancel a transaction on Electrum (not really cancel but) in such a way that you will be spending back to the initiator wallet, which means a new transaction spending same input is done to invalidate the stucked one(you will only pay high fee).

[Darker45]

I'm a bit confused. You paid your friend some BTC. Your friend uses Electrum while you don't. Your wallet doesn't allow personalized fees. How, then, did it end up that a very low fee was paid? Also, how did it end up that you're the one paying and yet your friend was the one asking the level of fee? And you answered the lowest. It doesn't seem coherent.

Anyway, if your friend is really the initiator of this transaction and he/she uses Electrum, he/she can resend it but with a higher fee. Electrum supports RBF. Your friend shouldn't worry about sending more coins. RBF isn't sending more coins. It is basically just sending the same input, the same money. With a higher fee, miners would prioritize it thereby cancelling the earlier transaction.