They received your return and the refund never posted

What the delivery scan proves, and what it does not

A carrier scan to the merchant's returns address does one useful thing: it moves the argument off whether the parcel arrived and onto what happened after it did.

It does not prove the parcel was opened, matched to your order, or accepted. Returns warehouses work by return authorisation number, and a parcel with no visible RMA on the outside can sit unmatched for weeks without anyone doing anything wrong. Quote the scan and the RMA in the same sentence, every time.

Check too that the scan is to the returns address the merchant gave you, not to the address the parcel came from. Retailers ship from one place and receive returns at another more often than customers expect.

Evidence to keep

• The carrier proof of delivery: tracking number, date, time, receiving location, and the scan or signature detail, screenshotted while the tracking page still exists.
• The RMA and the email that issued it, with the prepaid label or QR code the merchant supplied.
• The merchant's stated refund window, copied from their returns page on the day you read it. Policy pages are edited quietly.
• The order confirmation showing the item, the price, the tax, the shipping, and the card used.
• A dated log of every contact, with the reference number of each support ticket.

Processed is not posted

When a merchant says a refund has been processed, it generally means it has released a credit to its payment processor. From there it travels through the acquiring bank, the card network, and your issuer before it reaches your account — commonly a few business days, and longer across a statement close or a holiday weekend.

So ask for the artefact, not the reassurance: a refund confirmation showing the date and the exact amount, plus the refund transaction ID or acquirer reference number, the ARN. A merchant that has released the credit can often produce one, though not every agent has access to it and some processors do not surface it at all. A refusal to look, or an inability to name any release date, is worth noting — it is not by itself proof that no refund was issued.

An ARN gives your issuer something concrete to look up. Some will trace a credit with it; others will not, or only once you open a formal dispute. It is still worth asking for: with no reference and no release date, each side can say the other holds the money.

The clocks running against you

The first is the merchant's own. Their published window almost always runs from when the warehouse receives the return, not from when you posted it, so count from the delivery scan. Once it has passed you are pointing to a commitment the merchant published itself, which is worth saying plainly — though whether that window binds them as a contract term depends on how it was presented and on your state's law.

The second is your card issuer's, and it is the one people lose. If a refund was released and never posted, that may fall under the federal billing-error process for consumer credit cards; whether it does depends on your card, your issuer, and the facts. Where it applies, written notice has to reach the issuer's billing-inquiries address within 60 days after it sent the first statement showing the error, not 60 days from the delivery scan. Diarise that date before you start an email thread that will quietly consume it.

If you paid through a marketplace or a payment service rather than direct, that platform's dispute window is a third clock, set by its terms rather than by law. It may be shorter or longer than the other two, so look it up and diarise it separately.

Escalation order

1. The merchant's support channel, in writing. Give the order number, the RMA, the tracking number, the delivery scan date, and their own stated window, then ask two questions: on what date was the refund released, and what is the refund transaction ID or ARN.
2. The merchant's returns or billing escalation, once front-line support has sent a second templated reply. Ask for the decision and the reason in writing, and repeat the release-date and reference question. Their answer decides the next move: a date and a reference mean the credit is in the network and further chasing is wasted effort, while a second "processed" with neither is itself the fact to record — processed, no date and no reference supplied — and to put in front of the issuer.
3. Your card issuer, first as an enquiry: has any pending credit from that merchant arrived, and here is the ARN if you have one. An enquiry is usually quicker than a formal dispute and can settle the matter without one. Ask whether any fee or dispute record attaches before you file anything formal.
4. Your card issuer formally, if no credit exists. There is more than one route on a credit card — a billing-error notice, and a separate claims-and-defences route — with different requirements and different deadlines. Send written notice inside the billing-error window even if you are still waiting on the merchant, and ask your issuer which route fits your facts, or read the CFPB guidance on card disputes.
5. The marketplace or payment service's own dispute process if you did not pay the merchant directly, and your state consumer protection office where a retailer appears to be ignoring its published return policy as a matter of practice.

When the refund posts but the number is wrong

A short refund is a different problem from a missing one. Compare the posted amount against the order line by line rather than against the total. The usual deductions: a restocking fee where the policy discloses one; outbound shipping, which most policies do not refund; return postage taken out of the credit when you used their label; a condition deduction where the item came back opened or worn; and a recalculated discount where returning one item drops a multi-buy order below its qualifying amount.

If the deduction was disclosed in the policy in force when you ordered, the merchant will point to that term and you may be asking for an exception rather than pointing to a breach; whether a disclosed term binds you depends on how it was presented and on your state's law. If it was not disclosed, or the amount does not match the disclosed figure, that discrepancy is your case — put the policy text and the posted amount side by side and ask them to reconcile the two.

Exceptions and limits

• Final-sale, clearance, personalised, perishable, and opened hygiene or media items. A warehouse receiving a parcel is not the same as it accepting an eligible return. If the item was ineligible, ask what was done with it — returned to sender, held, or destroyed — because that decides whether you are chasing money or an item.
• Store credit. Some policies refund to the original payment method only inside a shorter window and switch to credit after it; check when the credit expires and what it excludes before accepting. Gift returns are usually settled the same way.
• Returns sent to the wrong address. If you used the merchant's own label the destination was their choice, which is a strong point when you ask them to trace it, though who bears a misrouted return depends on their terms and the carrier's. If you addressed it yourself from an old email, the scan proves delivery somewhere but not to them — ask the carrier about recovery straight away, because that option closes fast.
• Marketplace and third-party sellers. On many marketplaces the seller rather than the platform is responsible for the refund, but who is on the hook depends on the platform's terms, who was merchant of record, and your state's law. Check which name appears on your statement and read the buyer-protection terms before deciding who to pursue.
• Buy-now-pay-later plans. With most, the refund reaches the lender first and instalments can keep falling due until the lender applies it, so check how yours handles it. Stopping payments can carry fees and, with some providers, credit-reporting consequences — confirm with the lender before you do.
• A refund to a card you have since closed. A credit sent to a closed account does not usually just disappear, and issuers typically have a process for the resulting credit balance. Ask yours what it is rather than assuming the money is gone.

Official sources

• CFPB — getting a refund on something bought with a credit card ↗
• CFPB — how to fix mistakes in your credit card bill ↗
• CFPB — how do I dispute a charge on my credit card bill? ↗

Rules referenced in this guide, named so you can read the current text yourself:

• The federal billing-error process for consumer credit cards, including a failure to post a credit, comes from the Fair Credit Billing Act and its implementing regulation. The CFPB pages linked above set out the 60-day notice period and what the issuer must then do — confirm the current text there, and note that the clock runs from the statement rather than from the delivery scan.
• Refund settlement timetables between a merchant's processor and your card issuer come from the card networks' operating rules rather than from statute, and are not published for consumers. Your cardholder agreement and your issuer's dispute pages are the practical reference.
• Several U.S. states require retailers to display their return policy conspicuously and impose a default refund right where they do not. Whether one covers your purchase depends on where you bought — look up your state's return-policy statute on your state attorney general's site.
• Debit-card and prepaid-card claims fall under a separate federal regime from the credit-card billing-error process, and it covers a narrower set of problems: a merchant that has not sent a promised refund may not fit it the way it fits a credit card. Deadlines and coverage both differ — confirm them with your bank and on the CFPB's debit-card guidance.