Create a refund

POST /transfer/refund/create

Use the /transfer/refund/create endpoint to create a refund for a transfer. A transfer can be refunded if the transfer was initiated in the past 180 days.

Refunds come out of the available balance of the ledger used for the original debit transfer. If there are not enough funds in the available balance to cover the refund amount, the refund will be rejected. You can create a refund at any time. Plaid does not impose any hold time on refunds.

A refund can still be issued even if the Item's access_token is no longer valid (e.g. if the user revoked OAuth consent or the Item was deleted via /item/remove), as long as the account and routing number pair used to make the original transaction is still valid. A refund cannot be issued if the Item has an invalidated TAN, which can occur at Chase or PNC.

Request Body

Required

Defines the request schema for /transfer/refund/create

Parameters

client_id
string
Your Plaid API client_id. The client_id is required and may be provided either in the PLAID-CLIENT-ID header or as part of a request body.
secret
string
Your Plaid API secret. The secret is required and may be provided either in the PLAID-SECRET header or as part of a request body.
transfer_id
required, string
The ID of the transfer to refund.
amount
required, string
The amount of the refund (decimal string with two digits of precision e.g. “10.00”).
idempotency_key
required, string
A random key provided by the client, per unique refund. Maximum of 50 characters. The API supports idempotency for safely retrying requests without accidentally performing the same operation twice. For example, if a request to create a refund fails due to a network connection error, you can retry the request with the same idempotency key to guarantee that only a single refund is created.

Response

Defines the response schema for /transfer/refund/create

Response Properties

refund
required, object
Represents a refund within the Transfers API.
id
required, string
Plaid’s unique identifier for a refund.
transfer_id
required, string
The ID of the transfer to refund.
amount
required, string
The amount of the refund (decimal string with two digits of precision e.g. “10.00”).
status
required, string
The status of the refund. pending: A new refund was created; it is in the pending state. posted: The refund has been successfully submitted to the payment network. settled: Credits have been refunded to the Plaid linked account. cancelled: The refund was cancelled by the client. failed: The refund has failed. returned: The refund was returned.
failure_reason
required, object
The failure reason if the event type for a refund is "failed" or "returned". Null value otherwise.
failure_code
string
The failure code, e.g. R01. A failure code will be provided if and only if the refund status is returned. See ACH return codes for a full listing of ACH return codes and RTP/RfP error codes for RTP error codes.
ach_return_code
string
The ACH return code, e.g. R01. A return code will be provided if and only if the refund status is returned. For a full listing of ACH return codes, see Transfer errors. This field is deprecated in favor of the more versatile failure_code, which encompasses non-ACH failure codes as well.
description
string
A human-readable description of the reason for the failure or reversal.
ledger_id
string
Plaid’s unique identifier for a Plaid Ledger Balance.
created
required, string
The datetime when this refund was created. This will be of the form 2006-01-02T15:04:05Z
network_trace_id
string
The trace identifier for the transfer based on its network. This will only be set after the transfer has posted. For ach or same-day-ach transfers, this is the ACH trace number. For rtp transfers, this is the Transaction Identification number. For wire transfers, this is the IMAD (Input Message Accountability Data) number.
request_id
required, string
A unique identifier for the request, which can be used for troubleshooting. This identifier, like all Plaid identifiers, is case sensitive.