How do referral programs deal with refunds?
Let's say you have a referral program and someone who gets referred asks for a refund.
How do you handle this for the person that referred them?
I've seen providers that say you get paid out on the 1st of each month, so what if someone gets their refund on the 2nd - and you've already paid out the referrer.
Would it make sense to have a 30 day wait period for each payment?
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There's no fixed rule.
Some places will will not payout until the customer refund period has passed, for example wait 30 days after payment, then pay on the next month end - This does mean that payments can be 30-60 days behind.
I've seen others that clawback the refund amount on any next affiliate payout.
Personally I don't claw back the comission, as I want the affiliates to be happy and push more traffic and customers our direction - However in our terms we can hold back, or claw back, so if we saw a large number, suggesting something dodgy may be going on, then we would step in and look at it.
Thanks Tom.
When you say you don't claw back, do you mean you pay them the correct amount, as if the refund didn't happen - provided that there's nothing dodgy going on and refunds for that affiliate is rare