Policies: who decides, your limit, autonomy

Who decides

Policies → Who decides is the main switch for every new case. Pick one:

• You approve each case — Eturns recommends; money moves only after you approve in Decisions.
• AI decides within limits — eligible returns under your money limits are handled automatically. Everything else still comes to you.
• Pause AI — every case waits in Decisions. Use it when you are changing your rules or away from the store; the queue will grow.

New stores start on You approve each case. Even when Eturns decides within limits, it acts on its own only when it is at least 85% confident; below that, the case comes to you with the evidence and a recommendation.

Money limits

Three amounts decide how far Eturns may go on its own. Above them, cases wait in Decisions.

• Cash refund ceiling — the largest refund to the original payment Eturns may send by itself.
• Store credit ceiling — the largest store credit it may issue by itself.
• Keep-item under — below this amount, Eturns may let the customer keep the item instead of sending it back.

Your approval limit

Each store gets its own approval limit, set from its own orders: Eturns looks at your last 90 days and sets the cash limit where 75% of your orders fall at or below — between $50 and $2,000 (the Free plan stays at $50). Until you have 30 orders it starts at $150. Anything above your limit waits for you. Type your own number anytime and it stays yours — Eturns will only suggest changes.

Suggested limits work in USD, EUR, GBP, CAD, AUD, INR, JPY. In other currencies, the limit you type is the one Eturns uses.

When your orders change a lot, Policies shows Your orders suggest new limits. Choose Use these to accept them, or Keep mine to leave your numbers alone.

Presets and evidence

Under Evidence & risk policy, start with a preset:

• Balanced — common size and fit or change-of-mind cases can be handled automatically. Damage and quality go to Decisions.
• Strict — fewer automatic approvals. New and higher-risk shoppers come to you sooner.
• Custom — reason-by-reason control.

Choosing Custom opens Custom evidence & risk: which return reasons Eturns may handle on its own, which always come to you, which need photos and how many, what happens when evidence is missing, whether to offer an exchange first, the store-credit bonus, and the risk settings described in Risk checks.

Team seats

Anyone on your staff who can open Eturns can look around. Only staff with a seat can approve, decline, inspect, receive a return, send a ticket reply, or save Policies. The store owner gives and frees seats under Team seats in Who decides.

Eturns shows staff by an anonymous id, never by name or email. If every seat is taken, the next person can look but not act — free a seat or move to a plan with more.

Suggestions from your decisions

As you approve, change and decline cases, Eturns notices where its rules and your choices differ, and suggests one small change at a time — a single limit or a single return reason. Accepting one changes only that. A limit you typed is never changed without you.

How returns run

This area sets what happens once a return is approved.

• Return window — how many days after delivery a customer can start a return.
• Who pays return shipping — you, the customer, or free under an amount; other outcomes such as exchanges can differ.
• How they send it back — the default method on the portal, such as a prepaid label, QR drop-off, the customer shipping it themselves, or a home pickup, and whether customers may choose another.
• Fees — a return shipping fee and a restocking fee, with the cases where each is waived.
• How returns should feel — the presets Balanced, Delight and Margin protect set timing and warehouse defaults; Custom opens every setting.
• When returns arrive — who inspects returned items. This depends on your plan:

Who ships the exchange: when a replacement is approved, Eturns creates the exchange order in Shopify. The exchange order appears in your Shopify Orders list. Fulfil it there, or your connected fulfilment app picks it up as it does any order.

In-store returns through Shopify POS are switched on here too — see Returns at the counter.

What customers see

• Portal hub — the hub button label, the language, and “Powered by Eturns”.
• Journey — whether to show the return window, a satisfaction prompt, the success message, the help chat button, and review requests.
• Ticket targets — when a customer ticket should get its first reply and be resolved. See Tickets.
• Customer emails — which return, refund, exchange, warranty and tracking emails go out.
• The discount on the after-checkout offer — see Recovery offers.
• How Eturns sounds — the voice of every reply to your customers:

Saving and versions

Changes stay on screen until you choose Save policies. If a change could send more cases your way — switching to automatic decisions, or raising a limit — Eturns asks you to confirm the queue risk before it saves.

Each save publishes a new version. Cases already in progress keep the version they started with; new cases use the new one. If a save fails, your last saved policies stay in force and your edits stay on screen so you can try again.