How to handle a customer refund that hasn't processed yet?

[style-by-chica]

Hi!

I had an customer who placed an order from my shop but the item was sold out, so I arranged a refund for her after 2 days before the pay out day but I still recieved the money in my bank account on the pay out day.

The last updated on the order time line is that "the refund will be deducted from my pay out", and since that no further updates. Some where even said that the refund has been completed while the customer has not recieved the refund.

I don't know what to do the next! Can anyone please answer this? Should I do something? or simply just wait for 5-10 business days that the money will be transfered out of my bank? Will I be able to see further updates onthe order timeline when the customer recieve the refund??

Thanks!

[StephensWorld]

https://help.shopify.com/en/manual/payments/shopify-payments/getting-paid-with-shopify-payments/refu... 

"It can take up to 10 business days for your customer to receive the refunded amount."

If the order shows as the refund being completed, then the customer will receive the refund within a few days (see above). 

If you don't make any sales before your next payout period (meaning there's no money to deduct the refund from), then your payout balance will go into the negatives, and the above help page will outline what happens in that case (depending on which country you're from). 

[style-by-chica]

Hi!

Thank you for the reply!

I don't have further sales yet, so now I see the balance is negatives but I still have a few questions:

1, How do I know whether or when my customer recieve the refund?

2, How come now the negatives balance fund is higher than the actual fund I recieved from this order? what is the further charge?

3, I have requested to refund my customer several days before shopify has credited my account. Why could Shopify not inverse the amount and refund my customer prior to pay out to me?

Thanks again!

[StephensWorld · Accepted solution]

1. You won't know your customer received the refund (only they will know when they actually receive the funds back); you'll only see that it has been "completed" on the order details page. 99.999% of the time, if it says completed, then the customer received the refund a few days later. 

2. It's probably slightly higher than what you received because of the credit card fees that get deducted from the original payout. Or it could be that the customer purchased in a different currency from what you're receiving your payouts in, and the exchange rates have changed since they originally placed their order.

3. Shopify issues the refund when you refund the order, regardless of when your next payout is scheduled for. "It can take up to 10 business days for your customer to receive the refunded amount" though, so the customer won't see the refund immediately (banks and credit cards are slow to process things). 

Pretty much everything that I'm sharing here can be found in the help doc that I originally linked to. Please read the help doc (and watch the video in it)! 🙂