Pricing for returns, refunds, and exchanges
When a customer returns an item for a refund or an exchange, Sterling Order Management System Software can determine the price of the item in three different ways:
- By retrieving the original order
- By finding the lowest price on returns without a receipt
- By allowing manual overrides on return prices
Retrieving the original order
Sterling Order Management System Software can retrieve an original order from the database by using the order number from the customer’s receipt (barcode entry or keyed entry), or by using the customer’s name to search for previous orders made by that customer.
Finding the lowest price on returns without a receipt
If the customer does not have a receipt and the original order cannot be identified, a price for the returning item can still be retrieved. A CSR can perform a search for the lowest price for the item within a specified time period. This time period is configured in Sterling Business Center as "Sales Order Window For Return Processing." This setting can be re-entered by a CSR or store manager at the transaction level. For example, the time period over which to search could originally be configured as the default 60 days, but a CSR could specify 30 days as the search period when entering the transaction.
- From a performance standpoint, the length of the time period across which the search takes place has an impact on how long the search may take.
- Pricing rules can be suppressed at the transaction level, which also offers the flexibility to look for a discounted price, as well as pricing rules or promotions.
- If you enable pricing rule execution, then all applicable item quantity and combination pricing rules are evaluated as part of the lowest price search.
- At the transaction level, you can specify that price lists and pricing rule values that were assigned to specific customers or customer profiles be ignored.
- At the transaction level, you can specify that price lists and pricing rule values that were assigned to specific stores or store attributes be ignored.
- The flag, "Ignore Price List Quantity Tiers" specifies that if
the item was originally purchased as part of a quantity tier, the
search will not calculate the refund based on how many items were
purchased. When there is no information on what the quantity was on
original sales order, this computation will consider only the returned
quantity. Using this flag, you can tell the system to get the price
according to the quantity tier or get the lowest price irrespective
of any quantity tier.
For example, a customer purchased 5 pairs of socks and the tiered pricing was 1-5 socks for $3.00/pair and 6-10 socks for $2.50/pair. If IgnorePriceListQuantityTiers=Y, then the refund will be $2.50/pair, which is the lowest price. If IgnorePriceListQuantityTiers=N, then the refund will be based on what is the return quantity: in this case, 1 pair of socks for $3.00.
Manual overrides on return prices
If the system cannot determine the returning item’s price, a manager or a CSR with permissions can enter a manual override, according to options that have been configured for manager overrides.