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What are restocking fees and when should they be enforced?

Quick answer

Restocking fees can be withheld from a refund when an item is being returned by the buyer for preference-based reasons, within the guidelines of your Shop Policy on the listing.

A restocking fee is most commonly used to account for inspecting and re-packaging the item, as well as any loss in value that occurred during the delivery or return. This is a way for sellers to recoup some of their costs and can only be withheld if explicitly stated in one’s return policy prior to the purchase being made.

You can add a restocking fee to your Reverb Shop’s default return policy. Select the option I will also withhold a restocking fee and you can choose a percentage from the menu that appears.

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How do I apply a restocking fee to a refund?

When conditionally approving a buyer’s refund request, you can select Partial Refund to enter the refund amount with your restocking fee deducted.

Restocking fees should not be applied to orders that haven’t been shipped yet, or returns where the item arrived damaged or not as-described.

Why shouldn’t I charge a restocking fee on unshipped orders?

If an item hasn’t shipped, you should be refunding the buyer in full. That way, all fees are reversed and you won’t owe Reverb any money from the sale.

Your earnings are determined by the tracking information, and if the tracking information doesn’t update due to an order never shipping, your payment is not automatically initiated. As a result, you may end up getting billed for the partial refund before receiving your earnings from the sale.

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