Refunds

Our refund process has many features you can use to refund a transaction. You can explore how to refund a payment and deal with the invoice all at once, here.

How to complete a refund

1. To make a refund, you need to go to the payment you would like to refund

2. Click the Refund link on the right hand side of the Overview page under the transaction

3. You will be brought to the refund page that looks something like this

4. You can select the payment method the refund should go back to

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You can only refund payments back to the payment method they were paid with.

5. You will then be directed to select the line items you would like to refund

   • If you prefer, you will have the option of filling in the quantity or amount you are refunding, per line item

• If you have already refunded a line item in the invoice, it will still show up as a line item but you will not be able to select it
• Quantity decimal points in ChargeOver defaults to .000001

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If you would like the quantity decimal point adjusted, contact support.

You also have the option to refund a certain percentage of the payment

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The percentages in the drop down are the defaults for refunding. If you would like to personalize the percentage dropdown, contact us!

If you have some portion of the payment that is not applied to any invoices, there is a separate checkbox to refund that specific amount which is called Unapplied.

6. After deciding how much of the payment you want to refund, you'll have three options to choose from regarding what you would like to do with the invoice balance

   • Create a credit memo
   • Leave invoice open
   • Write-off refund amount

Close the invoice and create a credit memo

Definition of a credit memo

A receipt of a cash transaction used to record a refund or a decrease in the amount due from a customer or client.

How credit memos work with refunds

When you refund a payment, the invoice becomes unpaid. The credit memo is then applied to the invoice marking it as paid. This is why you will see three listed transactions when you are looking back at the invoice after you have completed the refund.

The first transaction in the example, #325, is the credit applied to the invoice. The second transaction, #324, is the refund to the customers ACH account. And the third transaction, #258, is the original payment.

Use credit memos as often as possible during your refund workflow. This is the correct way to handle a refund from most accountants perspectives.

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It is not recommended to edit an invoices price after it has been paid. If you want the invoice to show the correct amount that should have been charged, you can unapply the payment, edit the amounts on the invoice, re-apply part of the payment to the invoice and then refund the remaining amount that is left on the original payment.

If you try and edit an invoice, this page will pop up:

Credit memos and taxes

Credit memos support tax and will be calculated from the time of purchase.

Close the invoice and create a write-off

Use this option if the customer will never pay and you are going to write the invoice off as bad debt.

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You will need to have this feature enabled for it to be an available option when refunding an invoice.

Keep the invoice open

Use this if the customer is going to pay with a different payment method way, or at a later date.

For example, say your customer paid with a credit card, but then they changed their mind and want to now pay with a different credit card or by ACH. You will have to give them a refund on their first payment, but keep the invoice open in ChargeOver after that, so they can pay again with the payment method they want to use.

7. After selecting what is going to happen to the invoice, you can click Refund and finalize the refund

info

Once the refund has been created, you will have the option to download a PDF receipt of the respecitve credit memo, refund or write-off, depending on what you selected, by clicking PDF Refund under the heading Refund Actions.

Recording a refund outside of ChargeOver

Most people use our 'refund with a manual check' option when they have completed a refund outside of ChargeOver and need to manually mark a payment in ChargeOver as refunded.

If you do not have the offline check option enabled yet, you will need to do so before recording a manual refund with this option.

Steps

1. Go to your settings
2. Click Payment Processing
3. Click Add or configure a payment method

4. Use the search bar to find the manual check option
5. Click Connect

6. Click Save

Now you will be able to use the refunded with a check option to complete a manual refund in ChargeOver. Follow the regular refund process, but select refund via check as the payment method dropdown option. When you choose this option, ChargeOver will not refund the customer again, all this does is create a record in ChargeOver that a payment was refunded. We recommend you leave a memo or a note on the refund, explaining where the paymenet was refunded outside of ChargeOver.

Do not edit paid invoices

Please do not edit paid invioces. It will mess things up not only in your ChargeOver account but for your customer as well.

For example, if a purchase is made in December 2026, but you are filing taxes on Jan 2, 2027 and then a return in 2027 after that, and you edit or void a 2026 invoice, you are editing something in a previously closed accounting period.

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Editing invoices from a previously closed accounting period may affect your tax liability with state or federal agencies, so proceed with caution!

Instead of editing the invoice, you can create an offset by creating a credit memo in 2027, that will prevent this from happening.

Why did my refund get declined?

When a refund is declined in ChargeOver, it can typically mean a few different things. Here a couple things to consider if you have a declined refund: Is the payment too new? Is the payment too old? Is it an ACH payment from QuickBooks Payments? Is it a tokenized payment from USAePay?

New payment

Was your refund declined because your payment is too new?

Most payment gateways will not allow a refund to be processed during the first 24-48hrs of a transaction. If you're trying to refund a recent payment, the best practice here is to wait 24 hours after the payment has been made and try the refund again.

Old payment

Was your refund declined because your payment is too old?

We typically see payment gateways with with a limited refund window that ranges anywhere from 60 to 90 days from the original payment date.

If you're trying to make a refund on a payment that's too old, best practice is to first reach out to your payment gateway and see what options they have for processing the refund.

If they're able to process the refund, you'll want to make sure to come back to ChargeOver and create a refund using the refund with a check option.

ACH payment

Was your refund declined because it is an ACH payment and your gateway is QuickBooks Payments?

Unfortunately due to a limitation on QuickBooks Payment's end, we are not able to send refunds for ACH payments.

The best practice here is to contact QuickBooks Payments and have them assist with processing the refund. Once the refund is initiated, you'll want to make sure to come back to ChargeOver and create the refund using the refund with a check option.

Tokenized payment

Was your refund declined because the payment was tokenized and your gateway is USAePay?

At this time we do not have support for tokenized refunds through USAePay. Best practice here is to contact USAePay and have them assist with processing the refund. Once the refund is initiated, you'll want to make sure to come back to ChargeOver and create the refund using the refund with a check option.

Refunding a payment same-day

If you have made a giant mistake and accidentally charged someone you shouldn't have or charged a customer too much, we DO support cancelling the payment and refunding it, day-of.

Steps to void a payment paid by mistake

1. Check with your payment gateway to be sure you can void a credit card payment after it has been sent to be processed. Then either ask them how to void the payment yourself, or have them void it for you in their system

2. Next, login to your ChargeOver account and find the customer and the payment you need to fail. Select the "Mark payment as declined/failed" action. You can find it on the right hand side of the payment overview page for the customer, under Payment Actions.

Completing these steps will ensure that the payment is marked as voided or failed with both your payment processor and ChargeOver.

Keep in mind

• With most payment processors, you will need to call them to cancel a transaction, regardless if it is a credit card or ACH payment

• Authorize.net is one of the payment processors that allows you to cancel a transaction yourself in their system. You can void both ACH transactions and credit card transactions with them. Steps on how to do this are here on their website.

Common questions

Do I have to refund to the customer's original payment method?

Yes. You can only refund to the original payment method the customer used. As a workaround, you can choose to issue the refund back via check.

When can the customer expect to see the refund returned to their payment method?

Your customer should see the refunded amount appear back in their bank account or on their credit card statement within 1 to 4 business days.

Can I refund more than the payment amount?

You will not be able to refund more than the amount of the original payment.

How long do I have before I lose the option to refund a payment?

The amount of time you have to issue a refund for a payment will depend on the payment gateway that you are using. Usually, payment gateways allow merchants at least 30 days to refund a payment.

Does a customer need to have an active subscription in order to be refunded?

No; you can still issue a customer a refund in ChargeOver even if they do not have a current subscription. Even customers who have been marked "Inactive" in ChargeOver can still be refunded for the payments they have made.

I issued a refund and now the invoice got re-charged for the amount of the refund. Why?

You should always check the audit log on your payments to see who made the payment in the first place. It could have been a co-worker of yours, or it could be you have one of our features enabled, called dunning and reminders.

Dunning and reminders can automatically retry payments for overdue or unpaid invoices. You can find your dunning settings by going to your settings, then your features and searching for dunning and reminders. From there, you can edit your dunning groups to stop charging for 100% of a payment for any overdue invoices. You could also mark an invioce as exempt from dunning if you only wanted to prevent one invoice from being re-charged automatically.

When an invoice is refunded and not voided or edited, it is marked as unpaid or overdue until it is voided out, edited to reduce the balance, or closed out by either the creation of a credit memo or when a payment is applied to it.

Invoices that are then left unpaid or partially paid will automatically be retried by the dunning and reminder process, depending on your settings.