Refund rules

Retail Extensions · Rule · checked 2026-10-24

Refund rules decides how the till may pay a refund back. A return against a sale goes back only by the payment methods that paid that sale, plus your store credit and any method you always allow: a sale paid by card is refunded to the card or to store credit, never in cash. A return without its sale goes back only by the methods you name, such as store credit. When the cashier opens a refund, the till dims the methods your rules leave out, with the reason, or stops the refund. This page covers what the app adds, how to set up your settings, how to switch it on, and how to remove it.

What it does

Before the refund choices open, your iVendNext sends the refund to the app's service, with the payment methods the till offers for it and the sale it refunds with the methods that paid it. The service answers from your settings.

The cashier sees	When
The methods that paid the sale, your store credit method and your Always allowed methods; the others dimmed, with "Not for this sale: Refunded only by the methods your rules keep for this sale."	A return against a sale, with Refund by the sale's own methods ticked. The same for an order's or a layaway plan's refund: every method that paid into it stays.
"This refund can't go ahead" and "None of the methods that paid for this can take its refund here. Get a manager."	None of the till's payment methods would stay. The till lists every payment method of its POS Profile, including one you switched off for returns.
Only the methods you named and your store credit method	A return without its sale, with methods named under Without its sale, only these methods. None of them offered here: the refund stops, naming them. With none named and Refund by the sale's own methods ticked, only your Always allowed methods and store credit, so a return without its receipt is no way round your rule.
The payment screen and the refund choices, as always	A sale, a return whose total is zero or more, or a till the check does not answer.
The refund goes on, and is flagged on Sales to review	The service did not answer within 3 seconds, has not been sent the app's user yet, or could not read your iVendNext.

Your store credit method is never dimmed. An exchange's returned items book store credit, whatever the replacement costs, so leaving store credit out would stop every exchange.

At a till with a cash drawer, an exchange whose replacement costs less pays the difference in cash. On a sale whose rules leave cash out, that exchange stops at its credit note. Return the items instead, then ring the new ones as a sale.

On a demo site, the refund of a cash sale: the card dimmed with the app's reason, cash and store credit offered

The rules name methods, not amounts: a sale paid half by card and half in cash may be refunded all by card, or all in cash. The app writes nothing to your iVendNext.

Each store refunding only its own sales needs no app. Search Desk for Retail Setting and leave Use inter-store transactions unticked (the default): a till then opens only its own store's sales for a return. A layaway plan's refund can still be paid at any of your stores.

What you set up first

Install the app from the App library (see About Retail Extensions). The install adds the role IVENDNEXT RFR Integration, with no one in it. The check comes in switched off.
Make a user for the app. Tick Is Desk User, give it the role IVENDNEXT RFR Integration alone and save. Then generate its API key: on the user, open Settings and press Generate Keys. Give the user no User Permissions.
Fill your settings (below).
Search Desk for Registered Application and open IVENDNEXT RFR Settings feed. Choose the app's user as its Application User and save. Leave the feed switched off.
Switch the check on (below).
In the App library, find the app under Installed and press Details. On the app's record, press Connect again. The record then says that it sent the API key of the app's user.

What installing Refund rules changes, read before you install it

If a refund must never go through outside your rules, change the check's When the service is down to Stop until the service answers (refuse), after Connect again. Every refund on its POS Profiles then waits on the service.

The settings

Search Desk for IVENDNEXT RFR Settings and press Add. Name the record Default: the service reads that one. Only a System Manager can add or change it, unless you give another role rights on it in Role Permissions Manager. Whoever keeps it needs Select on Mode of Payment.

Field	What it does
Refund by the sale's own methods	Tick it: a return against a sale goes back only by the methods that paid it, your store credit method and your Always allowed methods.
Store credit method	Your store credit payment method, never dimmed: keep one Mode of Payment of type Store Credit enabled, and choose it here: the till pays exchanges with it. Required when the box above is ticked; set it too when you name methods for a return without its sale.
Always allowed	Methods any refund may use, such as Cash. None: only the sale's own methods and store credit.
Without its sale, only these methods	A return without its sale goes back only by these and your store credit method. None: with Refund by the sale's own methods ticked, only your Always allowed methods and store credit; else as today.

On each POS Profile the rules apply at, tick Allowed in Returns for your store credit method and each card method a refund may go back to (search Desk for POS Profile, open it, and tick the box on each payment method's row). These rules only take methods away: a till where none of the kept methods is allowed in returns leaves the cashier nothing to choose, and refuses every exchange.
The service reads your settings again within a minute of a change.

The settings record Default: the methods rule ticked and the store credit method chosen

Switch the check on

Search Desk for Retail Extension Subscription and open Refund rules.
Read what it is sent, and tick the consent.
Choose the POS Profiles it answers. With none chosen, it answers every POS Profile.
Switch it on and save.

The check switched on for one POS Profile

What leaves your iVendNext

The app's service runs at refund-rules.ivendnext.app, hosted by CitiXsys in the US. After the install, and when you press Connect again, your site sends the service its key from the App library, its address, the check's signing key, and the API key of the app's user.

Before each refund the till pays, and at each Pay (answered at once, without a read), your iVendNext sends the refund: the store, the POS Profile, the company and the till's day and terminal, the signed-in cashier's user, the customer and their customer group, the price list, the currency and the till's language, the coupons, the details the cashier filled for the sale and for each line, each line's item code, item group, quantity, unit, price, amount and discount, the totals, the payment methods offered and the till's own reference for the refund. On a refund it also sends the original sale, which kind it was, and the payment methods that paid it. No card details are sent.

The service reads your IVENDNEXT RFR Settings record with the app's user. It keeps it for up to a minute and keeps nothing of a refund. It keeps your site's keys until you remove the app. It writes nothing to your iVendNext.

Limits

A settings change can take up to a minute to apply.
The rules name methods, never amounts: the cashier splits a refund between the methods kept.
At a till with a cash drawer, a cheaper exchange pays its difference in cash, which your rules may refuse (above).
Every Pay calls the service too, which answers a sale at once. The check takes one of the POS Profile's three checks.
A POS Profile takes at most three checks, 10 seconds together. This one asks for 3 seconds.
Until Connect again has sent the app's user, and whenever the service does not answer within 3 seconds, a refund goes on and is flagged for review. A refund after a quiet spell can take longer than usual.
The check does not run on a return sent to a register, a refund made in Desk, a gift card's balance paid out in cash, or the back office's own POS screen.
The cashier reads the app's own sentences, in English.
If you make the app's user a new API key, or disable and enable it, press Connect again.
After you install the app again, the check comes in switched off and your settings are gone. Add your settings again (the uninstall exported them to a file), give the app's user its role again, choose it again on IVENDNEXT RFR Settings feed, press Connect again, then switch the check on with its consent.

How to remove it

In the App library, find the app under Installed and press Details.
On the app's record, press Export and uninstall and confirm. iVendNext first exports your settings record to a file, and tells the service that the app was removed.
iVendNext removes the check, the settings record, the feed registration and the role.
Make a new API key for the app's user, or disable the user, so the key the service had stops working.