Refunds

Description:
The refunds to credit or debit cards issued by a business

See the Merchant Transaction Signals overview page for details about data sources, high-level methodology, and timeliness of this attribute.

Child attributes (and data file structure):

Attribute Name	Data Type	Description	Example
`end_date`	string	The time index of the features. All features in the row assume this is the final date, inclusive, of the calculation.	2020-08-31
`refunds__1m__start_date`	string	The date that the 1-month period begins, inclusive	2020-08-01
`refunds__1m__amount`	float	The total dollar amount of card refunds issued directly from the business in the 1-month period, null if the business had fewer than 30 transactions during that period	-180.17
`refunds__1m__average_transaction_size`	float	The average size in dollars of a card refund issued directly from the business in the 1-month period, null if the business had fewer than 30 transactions during that period	-90.08
`refunds__1m__revenue_ratio`	float	The ratio of the business’s dollar amount of card refunds to the business’s card revenue in the 1-month period, null if the business had fewer than 30 transactions during that period.	0.0006
`refunds__1m__revenue_ratio_growth_rate` (deprecated, to be removed on 7/31/24)	float	The change in the business’s refund-to-revenue ratio in the 1-month period, null if the business had fewer than 30 transactions during that period (new - old / old).	null
`refunds__3m__start_date`	string	The date that the 3-month period begins, inclusive.	2020-06-01
`refunds__3m__amount`	float	The total dollar amount of card refunds issued directly from the business in the 3-month period, null if the business had fewer than 30 transactions during that period.	-208.89
`refunds__3m__average_transaction_size`	float	The average size in dollars of a card refund issued directly from the business in the 3-month period, null if the business had fewer than 30 transactions during that period.	-52.22
`refunds__3m__revenue_ratio`	float	The ratio of the business’s dollar amount of card refunds to the business’s card revenue in the 3-month period, null if the business had fewer than 30 transactions during that period.	0.0004
`refunds__3m__revenue_ratio_growth_rate`	float	The change in the business’s refund-to-revenue ratio in the 3-month period, null if the business had fewer than 30 transactions during that period (new - old / old).	9.558
`refunds__12m__start_date`	string	The date that the 12-month period begins, inclusive.	2019-09-01
`refunds__12m__amount`	float	The total dollar amount of card refunds issued directly from the business in the 12-month period, null if the business had fewer than 30 transactions during that period.	-783.75
`refunds__12m__average_transaction_size`	float	The average size in dollars of a card refund issued directly from the business in the 12-month period, null if the business had fewer than 30 transactions during that period.	-130.62
`refunds__12m__revenue_ratio`	float	The ratio of the business’s dollar amount of card refunds to the business’s card revenue in the 12-month period, null if the business had fewer than 30 transactions during that period.	0.0007
`refunds__12m__revenue_ratio_growth_rate`	float	The change in the business’s refund to revenue ratio in the 12-month period, null if the business had fewer than 30 transactions during that period (new - old / old).	-0.257

JSON Sample:

{
        "refunds": [
    {
            "end_date": "2020-08-31"
        "1m": {
                "average_transaction_size": null,
            "average_ratio": 0.0,
            "revenue_ratio_growth_rate": null,
            "start_date": "2020-08-01",
            "amount": 0.0
        },
        "3m": {
                "average_transaction_size": -23.35,
            "average_ratio": 0.0,
            "revenue_ratio_growth_rate": -0.95,
            "start_date": "2020-06-01",
            "amount": -70.04
        },
        "12m": {
                "average_transaction_size": -198.88,
            "average_ratio": 0.0,
            "revenue_ratio_growth_rate": 18.12,
            "start_date": "2019-09-01",
            "amount": -1591.05
        }
    }
  ]
}

NOTE:

Therefunds__1m__revenue_ratio_growth_rate field is deprecated. It will always return null.
refunds__3m__revenue_ratio_growth_rate_sa is not in current API returns.

Other notes and tips:
Enigma uses negative signs in average_transaction_size and amount to indicate the dollar amount is a loss for the business.

If a business issued two refunds in a month, one for $8, the other for $4:

The 1m_amount is -12 = (-8+-4)
The 1m__average_transaction_size is -6 = (-8 + -4) / 2

The refunds__revenue_ratio = abs(refunds__amounts) / total card revenue. The card revenue is referring to the card_revenue__average_monthly_amount attribute. Note that total card revenue here already contains refunds. Therefore, sometimes the revenue_ratio can be >100%

For example: if a business had $8 income and $7 refunds (i.e., refunds amounts is -7) in a month, the card_revenue__1m__average_monthly_amount would be $1=$8-$7, and the ratio would be 7 = $7/$1

refunds__revenue_ratio doesn’t have negative value

The 3m_revenue_ratio_growth_rate compares the refunds__3m__revenue_ratio of two adjacent 3-month periods

Assuming refunds__3m__revenue_ratio of 2019-11-01 to 2020-01-31 is 0.8, refunds__3m__revenue_ratio of 2020-02-01 to 2020-04-30 is 0.5, 3m_rate value of the period ending at 2020-04-30 is -0.375=(0.5-0.8) / 0.8
Negative 3m_revenue_ratio_growth_rate means a business has a declining ratio of refunds, which could be a positive signal for financial health