026-refund-fees.rst (1994B)
1 DD 26: Refunds and Fees 2 ####################### 3 4 .. note:: 5 6 This is implemented (as of 2023-09-15). 7 8 Summary 9 ======= 10 11 This document discusses what should happen with deposit fees when a 12 deposit is refunded. 13 14 15 Motivation 16 ========== 17 18 When a user receives a refund, we have to decide what happens to the deposit 19 fee that was originally paid on the associated deposit. Originally, we said 20 that the deposit fee is waived when any refund happens. However, if the 21 refund fee is zero and the deposit fee is non-zero, this results in a 22 problematic scenario where merchants issue minuscule refunds that primarily 23 enable customers to effectively obtain the deposit fee. 24 25 26 Requirements 27 ============ 28 29 * If the refund and refresh fees are zero, it should be possible for 30 consumers to get 100% of their digital cash back on refunds. 31 * This should not result in a problematic situation where merchants 32 conspire with consumers and issue minuscule refunds to allow consumers 33 to work around deposit fees. 34 35 Proposed Solution 36 ================= 37 38 * Only waive the deposit fee for full refunds where for the 39 specific coin (!) the refunded amount is the total value of the 40 refunded deposit. 41 42 Alternatives 43 ============ 44 45 * Only waive the deposit fee for full refunds where for the 46 specific coin the refunded amount is the total value of the 47 denomination of the coin. This may slightly simplify the 48 logic, but has the problem that it does not enable 100% 49 refunds if the original payment already required a refresh 50 because the coin's value exceeded the paid amount. 51 * Waive the deposit fee on any (including partial) refund. 52 This creates a bad incentive structure if combined refresh 53 and refund fees are below deposit fees. 54 55 Drawbacks 56 ========= 57 58 * We need to update and test an already complex fee calculation 59 logic. 60 61 62 Discussion / Q&A 63 ================ 64 65 (This should be filled in with results from discussions on mailing lists / personal communication.)