The Best Approach When Writing a Refund Policy
Hey IndieHackers! My name is James and I'm the CEO/Founder of Vivifi.
If you're like me, you check a company's Refund Policy before you decide to make a purchase. I recently received positive feedback on my companies Refund Policy, and I wanted to share some advice for writing your own policy.
Background Info:
Vivifi is a compliance document (Privacy Policies, Cookies Policies, and Terms & Conditions) drafting service that drafts way cheaper and faster than traditional law firms. We're partnered with an international team of lawyers and compliance experts that draft the components of the documents and assemble them to meet each client's needs. We keep them updated as legislation changes occur, and update when our client's data practices change as well.
Our Refund Policy: https://vivifi.net/refund-policy/
4 Tips For Your Refund Policy:
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Write like a human. Not like a lawyer. Robots and lawyers are not going to be the ones reading your Refund Policy. Your existing/potential customers are the ones reading it. Write your policy using realistic syntax and make it easy to comprehend. Just because it's a "Policy", it shouldn't be stupidly complex. An 8th grader should be able to understand what the Refund Policy is.
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Give Examples. When writing your Refund Policy, you should give examples of full and partial refunds. In our policy, we expressed several examples of both. You should list the most common and predictable issues your customers might face. This will help the customer establish trust in your business.
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Be Honest. If there are common cases where your business can get abused, level with them. If there have been common issues you've faced, then you should be open about it. For example, we have a cancellation fee for monthly subscribers if they cancel their subscription after one month. This is because we make a profit on monthly subscriptions only after 3 months. We're a small business, and this hurts us when it happens. We said this in our Policy to give background on why we have that fee. Without an explanation, potential customers could be dissuaded by a fee.
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Set Customer Service Standards. One of the most important parts of your Refund Policy is setting the standards for your customer service. If a customer is checking out your Refund Policy, chances are they are on the fence about purchasing your product/service. This is a critical time to present the standards your company has for response times, communication protocol, and your companies ethos.
I believe that this approach is the most effective at promoting consumer confidence. We've received so many positive comments on Vivifi's Refund Policy which is why I decided to make this post.
Refund Policies are different from Privacy/Cookies Policies because they don't have to be drafted by a legal team. Anyone can write their own. Thank you for taking the time to read this post, I hope it helps!
