[Hidden-tech] Refund policies - marketing issue

[Marcia Yudkin]

Hi everyone,

Looking for your responses on money-back refunds in the light of new payment processor policies.

Paypal now charges sellers the normal processing fees where there is a refund to the customer.  Before, when you gave a refund the fees were reversed as well, but no longer.

I just learned that Stripe, which handles many of my transactions, is going to have the same policy starting April 1st.

Now this might not seem like a big deal, but last month I had a customer sign up for an event and then two minutes later ask me for a refund, because they had forgotten to check their calendar.  Their forgetfulness cost me $9.00!

I have always been a big fan of no-risk, money back for any reason policies if you are not satisfied, with a few exceptions.

But it seems massively unfair for the seller to lose money because of customer flightiness or mistakes.  

On the other hand, telling customers about the new policies and either restricting refunds or charging the fee to the customer seems wrong in most instances.  I think they will expect you to absorb the extra charges as a "cost of doing business."

What is your opinion?

Marcia Yudkin
Goshen
www.yudkin.com