Typically, if a customer changes their mind about a purchase, they might not be able to get their money back. This can be frustrating for shoppers, who might turn elsewhere to find better customer service. Fortunately, you can offer store credit to honor a change of mind refund for your customers.
This can help reduce revenue loss and product returns for your business while keeping shoppers happy. Better yet, it can be a great way to boost sales, as there’s less risk involved with purchases.
In this post, we’ll take a closer look at change-of-mind refunds and how they can benefit your business. Then, we’ll show you how to use WooCommerce store credits for refunds in your store. Let’s get started!
What A Change Of Mind Refund Means
If a customer makes a purchase and there’s a problem with the product, they might ask for a refund. For instance, the item could be faulty or the fit might be wrong.
However, in some cases, shoppers don’t have an automatic right to get their money back simply because they’ve changed their minds. Of course, this depends on the country of residence and the country that the product was bought from.
For example, in the UK, there’s a 14-day cooling-off period for online purchases. Since customers can’t see the physical product before buying it, they can return items without a reason:
In some countries, change of mind refunds come at the discretion of the seller. Therefore, you’ll need to check your obligations as a business.
It’s also important that you make your refund policy easily accessible. For instance, most companies dedicate a page to this information or include it in a FAQ section.
Why You Should Consider Offering A Change Of Mind Refund
With the growth of digital shopping, more and more internet users are returning products that they buy online. In the US, 49 percent of users have returned a product in the past year.
In an effort to curb online returns, some companies have even started charging customers for sending their items back. As a result, the process of claiming refunds has become less accessible and convenient:
Since it isn’t always a legal requirement, giving change of mind refunds is a gesture of goodwill. It shows that you care about the customer experience, which can help you build trust, establish loyalty, and boost retention rates.
Store credit refunds enable you to keep the money in the company, helping you reduce revenue loss and product returns. Plus, providing a reasonable returns policy can encourage customers to buy more products, which can lead to more sales.
Lastly, you can market your change of mind refunds as a unique selling point. You can use it to show shoppers why they should choose your business over your competitors.
How To Use Store Credit To Offer A Change Of Mind Refund
Now that you know the benefits of offering change-of-mind refunds, let’s take a look at how you can use store credit to compensate your customers. For this tutorial, we’ll be using the free version of our Advanced Coupons plugin.
Advanced Coupons offers a ton of coupon deals and promotion options for your WooCommerce store. You can upgrade to a premium plan to access even more features and expert support:
To get started, you’ll need to install and activate the plugin on your WordPress site. Once that’s done, you’ll see Coupons appear in the menu on the left-hand side of your dashboard.
Then, you can head to WooCommerce > Orders and select the order you want to refund:
Next, scroll down and select the Refund button below the order:
Here, you can enter the amount you want to refund as store credit. You might also provide a reason for the refund. Then, you can click on Refund X to Store Credits:
To view a customer’s store credit history, navigate to Coupons > Manage Store Credits:
You can view your clients’ store credit balance by switching to the Customers tab. If you want to add more credit to a customer’s refund, simply hit Adjust:
It’s important to note that customers will have a Store Credit tab in their accounts. This means they can easily check to see how much store credit they have acquired.
Conclusion
Although you’re not required to provide refunds when buyers change their minds, offering this option can help you increase customer satisfaction. By giving store credit to be used on future purchases, you can lessen revenue loss while boosting customer satisfaction.
With Advanced Coupons, giving store credit refunds is just as easy as giving any other refund. Simply find the relevant order and apply your store credits in one click. Plus, you can view, manage, and manually adjust store credits from our user-friendly dashboard.
Do you have any questions about using store credit for change-of-mind refunds? Let us know in the comment section below!
