What is a return policy for an online store?

Two things go by similar names and are not the same. The return policy is the page your store writes with its conditions. And MerchantReturnPolicy is that policy written in structured data for a search engine. This entry is about the first one, and it matters twice over: your customers read it before buying, and more and more machines read it on their behalf to say, next to your product, whether it can be returned, within how many days and who pays.

What it includes

What your store decides. The policy is yours, and these are the decisions it has to put in writing:

• The deadline, in days.
• The condition in which you accept the product.
• How it is returned: by mail, in store or at a pickup point.
• Who pays for the way back, and whether that changes when the product arrives defective.
• What the customer gets: the money, an exchange or store credit.
• The exceptions, product by product or by category.
• The countries where it applies.

What search engines and agents read

Google. Its search can show the return policy next to your products and in knowledge panels from your markup, and it also accepts it configured in Google Merchant Center or in Search Console; if you have it in both places, the configuration wins over the markup.⁠^{[1]Google Search Central. Merchant return policy (MerchantReturnPolicy) structured data} Which properties it uses is covered in the MerchantReturnPolicy entry.

Merchant Center. Google says return information can help the performance of your products and that it appears in your ads, your free listings and Gmail. In exchange it asks for four things: the URL of the policy on your site, that the page can be read without signing in, registering or giving personal data, that it says the same in Merchant Center and across the whole site (the footer, the returns page, the notices) and that the policy does not stop at defective products but also covers the customer who simply changes their mind.⁠^{[2]Google Merchant Center Help. Set up your return policies for Shopping ads and free listings}

ChatGPT. The product feed specification that OpenAI accepts has three optional fields for this, product by product: accepts_returns (whether returns are accepted), return_deadline_in_days (the number of days) and return_policy (the URL of the policy). The specification warns that the policy URL does not fill in or replace the field that says whether returns are accepted: if you only send the link, that answer stays unspecified.⁠^{[3]OpenAI. Products (product feed specification)} The entry on the product feed for ChatGPT explains the rest of the file.

In a store

Fictitious example. An invented clothing store publishes this policy, and this is how it translates into what each machine reads:

Look at the two rows without a field. What does not fit in a field only reaches a machine if the page says it clearly, and it only reaches a customer if the page can be read without an account.⁠^{[3]OpenAI. Products (product feed specification)}⁠^{[2]Google Merchant Center Help. Set up your return policies for Shopping ads and free listings} The same 30-day deadline has to appear identically on the page, in Merchant Center and in the feed.

How to check it

1. Read your policy from start to finish: the deadline, the condition of the product, how it is returned, who pays for the way back, the countries and the exceptions with their reason.
2. Open it in a private window, signed out. If it asks for an account or personal data, Merchant Center will not accept it.⁠^{[2]Google Merchant Center Help. Set up your return policies for Shopping ads and free listings}
3. Look for the deadline everywhere: the page, the footer, the site notices, the Merchant Center settings and the Search Console settings. It has to be the same number.⁠^{[2]Google Merchant Center Help. Set up your return policies for Shopping ads and free listings}
4. If you send a feed to ChatGPT, check the three returns fields and not just the link.⁠^{[3]OpenAI. Products (product feed specification)}
5. Check where Google reads your policy from. If you have it configured in Merchant Center or in Search Console, what your markup says moves to the background.⁠^{[1]Google Search Central. Merchant return policy (MerchantReturnPolicy) structured data}

Related concept: MerchantReturnPolicy

The return policy is the document, with its fine print. MerchantReturnPolicy is its summary in closed values, the country, the type of window, the days, the method or who pays, that a search engine can compare across stores. The order is always the same: first you decide and publish the policy, and then the markup copies exactly what it says. Which properties Google asks for, where it is declared and which source wins over which is in the MerchantReturnPolicy entry.

To go further, the catalog and entities reading path orders the rest of the terms, and the OfferShippingDetails entry covers the other half of what a customer looks at before paying: shipping.