📦 Business & freelancing · Guide
Sorting It Out
Refunds, breakages and the messages you would rather not open.
Sorting It Out
Refunds, breakages and the messages you would rather not open.
Your name
A4 · this is a layout preview in the “Sticker” design. When you generate, the studio writes every chapter in full, paints the cover and chapter art, and composes a downloadable A4 PDF with your name, bio and store link on it.
Every seller gets the message eventually: it arrived broken, it is not what I expected, I have changed my mind. Handled badly it costs you an evening and a customer. Handled plainly it takes four minutes and often brings the person back. This guide gives you the policy, the wording and the order to do things in.
What's inside
- 1Write The Policy OnceDeciding your windows, who pays return postage and how made-to-order work is treated, then putting it where buyers see it. After it you have a policy you can quote instead of renegotiating in every message.
- 2Broken In The PostAsking for photographs, refunding or replacing quickly, and claiming from the courier without dragging the buyer into it. After it you can settle a breakage in one exchange of messages.
- 3It Arrived, They Changed Their MindHandling straightforward returns, checking condition, and refunding without a lecture. After it you can process a change of mind without it feeling like a loss.
- 4Not As DescribedWorking out whether the listing, the photograph or the expectation was at fault, and what to change afterwards. After it each complaint improves the listing that caused it.
- 5The Message That Is Not Really About The OrderRecognising anger that belongs elsewhere, staying short and civil, and knowing when to stop replying. After it you can close a difficult thread without escalating it.
- 6What To Fix AfterwardsKeeping a simple log of every refund and its cause, and reading it once a quarter. After it you can see whether the problem is your packing, your courier or your photographs.
A sample from chapter one
Write the policy once, then stop negotiating
A returns policy is written for the day you are tired and cross, not for the day you publish it. Decide now how long a buyer has to tell you something is wrong, who pays return postage in each case, and what you will do about items made to order. Put it on the listing page as well as a policy page, in exactly the same words.
Check your wording against the current UK rules for distance selling, which give most online buyers a cancellation window after delivery and treat personalised items differently. You may be more generous than the law; you may not be less. Once it is written, quote it calmly rather than reinventing it in each message, which is where inconsistency and resentment both creep in.
- Refund breakages on a photograph rather than a returned parcel; return postage usually costs more than the piece.
- Reply within a day, even when the reply is only that you are looking into it.
- Put the money back before you ask any further questions about what happened.
- Keep one folder of damage photographs so you can see whether it is your packing or the courier.
Key takeaways
- Almost every awkward message gets shorter once the refund has already happened.
- A policy you quote consistently is kinder than a policy you improvise each time.
- Two breakages on the same route is a packing problem, not bad luck.
The studio writes every chapter from this outline, paints the art and hands you a PDF you can sell the same afternoon.
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