Refund & Return Metrics

Overview

Refund and return metrics track the financial impact of orders that were returned, refunded, or cancelled. These costs directly reduce your Operating Profit. Understanding how Dashboardly attributes and calculates refunds helps explain differences you may notice between Dashboardly and TikTok Seller Center.

Metrics

Gross Sales Refund

• What it shows: The pure product value refunded to customers, without including tax or shipping refunds.
• Formula: Sum of refunded product amounts (from return_line_item.sale_price)
• Where you see it: Profit & Loss (within Refunds & Returns breakdown)
• Important notes: This specifically excludes shipping fee refunds and tax refunds. It represents only the product portion of the refund. This matches the "product-only" refund concept -- shipping and tax refunds are tracked separately.

Other Refund Costs

• What it shows: The shipping fee portion of refunds.
• Formula: Sum of shipping fee refunds from returned orders
• Where you see it: Profit & Loss (within Refunds & Returns breakdown)
• Important notes: This captures the shipping fees you had to refund. It is kept separate from Gross Sales Refund so you can see exactly how much of your refund costs come from product value versus shipping.

Refunds & Returns

• What it shows: The total financial impact of all refunds, returns, and cancelled orders combined.
• Formula: Gross Sales Refund + Other Refund Costs + Cancelled Order Value
• Where you see it: Dashboard, Profit & Loss, Sales & Profit
• Important notes: This is the combined total that appears as a single line item in the Operating Profit calculation. It includes the value of cancelled orders alongside traditional refunds and returns.

Returns Count

• What it shows: The number of orders with returns or refunds.
• Formula: Count of distinct orders with return/refund activity
• Where you see it: Dashboard, Profit & Loss
• Important notes: This counts unique orders, not individual units. If a single order had 3 units returned, it counts as 1 return order. The count includes both returns (item sent back) and refund-only resolutions (money refunded without item return).

Cancelled Orders

• What it shows: The count of orders, number of units, and financial value of cancelled orders.
• Formula: Count and sum from orders with CANCELLED status
• Where you see it: Profit & Loss, Dashboard
• Important notes: Cancelled order value represents the payment amount that would have been collected. This is shown as a negative number in the data because it reduces your profit. Cancelled orders are attributed to the date they were cancelled (the completion date), not the date the order was originally placed.

How These Metrics Connect

Refund metrics flow into the overall profit picture:

1. Gross Sales Refund captures product value lost to refunds
2. Other Refund Costs captures shipping fees lost to refunds
3. Cancelled Order Value captures revenue lost to cancellations
4. All three combine into Refunds & Returns, which is subtracted in the Operating Profit formula

On the Profit & Loss page, you can see the full breakdown of each component. On the Dashboard, you see the combined Refunds & Returns total.

Common Questions

Why do my refund numbers not match TikTok Seller Center?

The most common reason is date attribution. Dashboardly attributes refunds to the date the refund was completed (processed), not the date it was requested. If a customer filed a return on January 28 but the refund was processed on February 3, Dashboardly shows it in the February 3 data. TikTok Seller Center may display it differently depending on which report you are viewing.

Why does TikTok show higher "Refunds" than Dashboardly's Refunds & Returns?

TikTok's "Refunds" figure in some reports may include cancelled order values. Dashboardly tracks cancelled orders separately but includes them in the combined Refunds & Returns total. Make sure you are comparing the same scope.

Why is my Gross Sales Refund different from the total refund amount I see on TikTok?

Gross Sales Refund only includes the product portion of refunds. TikTok's total refund amount typically includes product + shipping + tax refunds combined. In Dashboardly, shipping refunds appear under Other Refund Costs.

Do refunded orders still count toward COGS?

If the product was physically returned to you, no -- COGS is not counted. If the customer received a refund but did NOT return the product, COGS is still counted because you lost that inventory.

Why are cancelled orders shown on a different date than when the customer placed them?

Dashboardly follows TikTok's convention of attributing financial events to their completion date. A cancellation is a financial event that occurs when the order is cancelled, not when it was created. This ensures your daily P&L accurately reflects what happened financially on each day.