Placing an order spans the payment, inventory and shipping services, each with its own database and team. What is the usual way to keep them consistent?

Options

• ✗ Two-phase commit across the three databases
• ✓ A saga: local transactions in order, each with a compensating action if a later step fails Correct
• ✗ One shared database for all three services
• ✗ Retry every step forever until it succeeds

Why

A saga avoids locks held across services. If shipping fails, the saga runs the compensations: release the stock, refund the payment. It is orchestrated by a coordinator or choreographed with events.

Review this in your daily deck → All cards in Consistency