Examples, methods and systems described herein may include determining, by a payment processing system, whether a second payment mechanism may be used to perform a payment transaction when a first payment mechanism is preferred and/or when the first payment mechanism has failed. Determining to use the second payment mechanism can be based on (i) an analysis of a communication status indicator received from a point-of-sale (POS) terminal that indicates which payment mechanisms are capable of communicating with the POS terminal, (ii) data received from the POS terminal that is associated with a read of a payment object, and/or (iii) an allowance criterion.