By default, no. When a customer's own change leaves them owed money, Tacey waits for you to approve the refund before anything is sent. If you would rather not approve each one, you can switch on Refund customers automatically and Tacey sends them for you.
Where to find it
Editing Tools → Global settings → Refunds.
What the setting does
Refund customers automatically is off by default.
Off (the default). When a customer's change means they are owed money, nothing is refunded yet. The order shows a notice, A refund is waiting for your approval, and the order is listed under Action needed. You open the order and click Approve refund when you are ready. The page reminds you: "Refunds wait for your approval. Open the order and choose Approve refund to send one."
On. Tacey refunds the customer to their original payment method without waiting for you.
Which refunds it covers
The setting's own description names them: a discount a customer applied after checkout (Apply a discount), and a cheaper product they switched to (Replace product). In both cases the customer already paid full price and the difference is owed back to them.
It does not cover:
Cancellations. When a customer cancels with Cancel order, their refund is part of the cancellation itself and is sent straight away, to the destination you chose on that tool.
Removing or reducing an item with Change product options. That refund is sent as soon as the customer confirms the change.
Store credit. If a tool is set to give store credit rather than a card refund, the credit is issued when the customer confirms. There is no approval step for store credit.
How to change it
Open Editing Tools and choose the Global settings tab.
In Refunds, switch Refund customers automatically on or off.
Click Save.
Approving a refund that is waiting
Open Orders and choose Needs your action, or follow the Orders that need your action card on Home.
Open the order. You will see A refund is waiting for your approval.
Click Approve refund.
When you approve, Tacey asks Shopify again for what the customer is owed right now and refunds exactly that, once, to their original payment method. If several changes on the same order each left money owed, one refund covers them all.
After you click, the page tells you what happened:
"Refund sent. The ledger records it."
"Shopify no longer shows this customer as owed money, so no refund was sent." This happens if you already refunded them by hand.
"Shopify did not accept the refund. Nothing was sent; the ledger records Shopify's reason so you can refund by hand."
"Shopify could not be reached. Nothing was recorded as sent; try again in a minute."
When it is on, when does the refund go out?
Not the instant the customer confirms. Tacey waits until the customer has stopped making changes to the order for about 15 minutes, then refunds what Shopify says is owed at that moment. That way a customer who makes three changes in a row gets one correct refund rather than three partial ones. In practice the refund goes out 15 to 30 minutes after their last change.
Should I turn it on?
Leave it off if you want to see every refund before it leaves your account, or if you sometimes prefer to settle a customer differently. The trade-off is that the customer waits until you act, so check Action needed regularly.
Turn it on if you trust your discount and product settings and would rather not handle each refund. Every refund still appears in the ledger, whether it succeeded or failed.
What this does NOT do
It never refunds more than the customer paid. Tacey checks Shopify's own maximum refundable amount first and refuses anything above it.
It does not change the amount. The figure is always Shopify's, whether you approve it or it goes out automatically.
It does not affect charges. A customer who owes you money always pays through Shopify's own payment page.
An owed refund never expires. It waits until you approve it.
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