How to contact an exchange when a swap fails and actually get a reply

05 September 2026

You contact a swap exchange through its official support channel - usually a ticket system, email, or live chat - and you get a reply by including every piece of evidence the support team needs to identify your transaction without them having to ask follow-up questions. Most failed-swap tickets go ignored or get a generic auto-reply because the sender omitted the one detail that lets support find the order.

Here is what to include in your first message, and what not to do.

Before you write anything

Confirm that the swap actually failed. A transaction that is still pending, or one that shows as "completed" on the block explorer but with unexpected outputs, is not a failed swap. Read your transaction on a block explorer first. That is covered in detail on the sibling page "How to read a swap transaction on a block explorer to see what went wrong." If you skip that step, you risk sending support a ticket about a transaction that is still processing or that completed correctly to an address you misread.

Also confirm that you sent your funds to the exchange's address and not to a scam address or a different token contract. The hub page "Swapping crypto safely" explains the checks that prevent those mistakes. If you sent the wrong token or used the wrong network, the exchange may not be able to recover your funds at all, and the ticket will get a different kind of reply.

What to paste into the first message

The single most useful piece of information is the swap order ID or swap reference number. This is the internal identifier the exchange assigned to your swap when you started it. It is not the same as a transaction hash. Look for it in your browser history, in the URL of the swap page while it was running, or in any confirmation email or page the exchange showed you after you initiated the swap. If you have that number, put it on the first line.

If you do not have the order ID, provide:

• The transaction hash of the outgoing payment you sent to the exchange.
• The exact amount you sent, including decimals (e.g., 0.123456 ETH, not "about 0.12 ETH").
• The token you sent and the token you expected to receive.
• The date and approximate time (in UTC) of the swap.
• The wallet address you sent from.

Attach screenshots of the swap page before you clicked confirm, showing the quoted rates and the destination address. Those are the screenshots described on the sibling page "What details to screenshot before confirming a swap." Without them, support cannot verify the terms you agreed to.

Which channel to use

Use the exchange's official support ticket system if one exists. That is where replies are tracked and escalated. Email is second-best. Live chat is fast for simple questions, but support agents in live chat often cannot access order details - they will create a ticket anyway. Do not use social media DMs or Telegram groups run by third parties. The official support page is the only channel that guarantees your message enters the exchange's internal system.

What not to do

Do not send multiple tickets for the same swap. Each new ticket creates a separate case, and support may close duplicates without reading them. Do not threaten or demand. Support agents handle hundreds of tickets; a polite, precise message gets read sooner than an angry one. Do not ask "Is my swap stuck?" without providing the details above. That question gets an auto-reply asking for the same information you should have included the first time.

How long to wait

Most exchanges reply within 24 to 72 hours. If you hear nothing in 72 hours, reply to your own ticket with a brief update: "Still waiting on swap [order ID]." Do not open a new ticket. A single bump is usually enough to move your case up the queue. After a week with no reply, the exchange may have lost your order or does not intend to resolve it. At that point, consider whether the amount lost is worth further pursuit.

If you get a reply

Follow the instructions exactly. If support asks you to confirm your receiving address again, do it in the same ticket thread. If they ask you to send a verification transaction, they will tell you the amount and the destination. Never send funds to an address support gives you over an unverified channel. If the reply directs you to a website that looks different from the one you used, stop and verify the domain independently.

The checks worth making before sending funds to any exchange address are all described in the hub page "Swapping crypto safely." If your swap failed, you likely missed one of them. Read that page before your next swap.

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