Blog
Notes from the audit.
Plain writing on returns, restocking and the money that leaks between them.
- Operations
Shopify returns without a returns app: the manual process, done well
Plenty of small stores handle returns by hand in the Shopify admin. That works, if the four steps happen in the right order. Here they are.
- Guide
How much is a missed restock worth? A back-of-envelope method
A five-minute way to estimate what unrestocked returns cost your store per quarter, using numbers you already have.
- Operations
Multi-location returns: where did the unit actually go back?
With more than one stock location, a return can be restocked to the right count in the wrong place. How to keep location out of the leak.
- Returns
Restock recorded, stock unchanged: the return that looks handled and is not
The quietest way to lose a unit is a restock that was recorded but never adjusted inventory. Here is why it happens, why it is hard to see, and how to watch for it.
- Accounting
Preparing returns data for your accountant: what a reconciliation packet should contain
At month end your bookkeeper needs a clean statement of what returns did to inventory. Here is the minimum it should contain and why each line matters.
- Guide
Shopify inventory states explained: available, committed, on hand, and where returns go
Shopify tracks several inventory quantities per variant per location. Knowing which one a restock changes explains most 'the count looks wrong' questions.
- Guide
What 60 days of refunds can tell you about your inventory
Why a rolling 60-day window is the right first look at returns integrity, what it can and cannot show, and how to read the result.
- Operations
The staff-turnover leak: why a clean quarter does not stay clean
Fixing the refund habit works, right up until the person who learned it moves on. A note on why returns integrity is a standing check rather than a one-time cleanup.
- Guide
Write-offs versus restocks: recording damaged returns properly
A damaged return is a real loss. Recording it as one keeps it from lingering in your admin as sellable stock and gives your accountant a clean line at month end.
- Returns
Why apparel and footwear stores leak the most inventory to returns
High return rates, deep size and colour variants, and returns that arrive long after the refund. Apparel has every ingredient for unrecovered stock, and a few habits that help.
- Checklist
A monthly returns reconciliation checklist for small Shopify stores
Twenty minutes a month, five questions, and a number at the end. A checklist for keeping returns from turning into unrecovered stock.
- Guide
Does your returns app really restock? How to check
Returns portals send a restock instruction when a return completes. None of them go back and confirm the count moved. Here is how to verify it yourself.
- Guide
What actually happens when you restock a return in Shopify
A walk through the records Shopify writes when a return is restocked, so you know which ones to check when a unit seems to have vanished.
- Guide
How to find phantom inventory in your Shopify store
Phantom inventory is stock your admin says you have that is not on the shelf, or stock on the shelf that your admin says is gone. Returns are the usual cause. Here is how to find it without a full stocktake.
- Guide
Refunded but not restocked: the Shopify checkbox that quietly loses inventory
When you refund an order in Shopify, one checkbox decides whether the unit goes back into sellable stock. Here is what happens when it is left unticked, and how to find the cases you already have.
- Guide
What a returns audit actually checks
The four ways a refunded unit fails to make it back onto your shelf, and what a returns audit does about each.