Apple ran a "Pending" charge against my cc over the weekend of Dec 1 & 2.
That pending charge came off my cc by Tuesday December 4. The only charge that went through with my order was for AppleCare.
I received my iMac on Thursday December 13, and it was several days (it may have been the following Monday) before the iMac charge appeared on my CC.
Once during the "Processing items" stage, the Apple charge appeared AGAIN on my cc under "Pending" but then went away.
Apple, any vendor for that matter, wants to know that they will be able to collect their payment prior to shipping the order.