Hi Everyone,
I started noticing these accounting discrepancies in February and glad to see I’m not the only one with these concerns.
We use Loop returns. After spending hours trying to understand what Shopify changed, and spot trends on 3rd returns app reporting I can now say this is complete Nonsense! Shopify has no clue how real business operations flow and keeping consistent accounting practices.
I feel now, everyone on the thread is concerned about payouts aligning to what are real refunds and returns along with finance summary reports and crap reporting methods when using 3rd party app such as a Loop returns. I’m happy to discuss with any questions and now feel the only way Shopify will address issues is if our collective voices make enough noise.
I get why Shopify made these reporting changes. THEY want better clarity and metrics on your business performance (think how often people may initiate a return).
Shopify has many financial solutions and this metric is just another they will use to say your net sales will be accounted for HOW THEY feel serves their internal decisions pertaining to our stores performance.
This is flawed and does not take into account many details of the sales process and how companies approve, refund, exchange, etc. For those interested, here is a transcript to our 3rd Party App Loop Returns. Shame on shopify!
They are introducing so many updates and changes to every aspect of the admin panel, reporting, basic dashboard layouts, and on and on.
We downgraded from Shopify plus because the only benefit was someone answering the phone to refer us to the same articles or to hire an expert. Since our sales were under 1.5M just didn’t see the benefit of reduced credit card fees.
NOW, I’m starting to believe that all these changes without clear training articles, announcements, and app interfrremce are to further confuse store owners and push them to paying $2500/month to get access to live person whom can attempt to answer questions on all the updates occurring weekly.
Am I alone in seeing this trend?
Anyhoo, I am normally the silent observer, but with 7 years on shopify, and testing most integrations, apps, or processes,
I feel that the community is our only place to get information and let Shopify understand what the real world is saying and feeling.
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BELOW Transcipt From Sexyshoes>Loop
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- returns, then don’t even return them. How can this be addressed and fixed?
- Non-Returnable items need to be confirmed that shopify sales reports are not getting a decrease in reporting.
- How is loop reporting to shopify and triggering returns/refunds from sales reports? We cannot even align our closed books for previous months sales when Loop is reducing our sales summary finance reports for historical booked days in previous months which seems to be happening. We need better understanding of this.
The articles I have read and updated as recently as 3/24/2024 are advising to implement far reaching accounting practices, multiple exporting reports, merging, updating data, etc. It’s really nonsense and not sure what can be done or if you are getting similar complaints.
There is heavy activity across the dev and chat boards, while nobody has really been clear on what occurred, why, and confirmation of what sales are getting decreased by Loop triggers, what happens when we don’t approve returns, and how true refunds/returns (actually received to our warehouse and approved) affect shopify.
For our accounting purposes:
Net Sales = Gross sales – discounts – refunds (can be from defective merch, or unable to fill) – returns (actually received to inventory for resales, not a pending arbitrary number based on an intention)
COGS = Beginning Inventory + Purchases – Returns (approved and received) – Discounts/allowances + Shipping collected – Ending Inventory value
From everything we are seeing these GAAP methods are not being followed, and or have become an endless rabbit hole of reporting and comparison which nobody has really addressed on the Loop or Shopify side to give advance notice or what happened.
Hope this helps clarify the concerns better.
Sincerely
Scott
REPLY LOOP BELOW
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Hello Scott,
Thanks for following up, jumping in and passing along this insight of what you are encountering!
In reviewing the points you provided, the behavior you are encountering with all returns, impacting your sales is a result of a change Shopify made recently. I do know Shopify sent this update to a merchant
Shopify did make this change and the visual reporting changes that you are encountering are stemming due to this change they made - not a change Loop made. That said, I can share that our engineers and product team are aware of the change Shopify made and they are actively working with Shopify to understand the changes they are making and how those interact with Loop! I will follow up in this thread to update you if and when our team receives any updates. 
Thank you for your agility regarding this Shopify change and your patience in helping me understand what you are encountering!
Best,
Rece
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In conclusion, this has probably been one of the most irresponsible changes Shopify has implemented without beta testing or getting input from their customers.
I hope this helps with some of your concerns. For store owners using integrated accounting software, I certain this will be a nightmare if you value GAAP reoccurred. You will most likely need to export several csv files from your apps and shopify, then do merges, updates, J/E adjustments with clear backups. This is a huge cost of time and just makes it harder to make informed business decisions. Did I mention how angry and disappointed I am with Shopify yet?
The Loop response was ridiculous and I’m cooling off before responding back to them.
LOOP was founded by ex-shopify engineers and built around a solid integration and understand of shopify platform. Even they have no clue 1 month after the roll outs occurred.
Hope this help the group. My apologies in advance for grammar issues. This is a quick rant done my cell. Please don’t send my spelling correction notices. Just trying to help those who are frightened, or not clear on what triggered this.
Let’s hope that shopify reverses this change, or at least updates some flexibility with 3rd party return apps which actually create refunds once received and approved, etc.
Shopify did revert the sales dashboard a few weeks ago to show your sales metrics on the page. That was another boneheaded update, so they may actually be listening when enough customers started engaging the community.
Good Luck!
Scott