Store terms and conditions that help in a dispute

Most store owners write their terms and conditions once, usually from a template, and never read them again. Then a dispute arrives, the bank asks for your policy, and you discover that the page you are about to send contradicts the law, contradicts your product pages, or says nothing useful at all. A set of terms that should have protected you has become the weakest document in your evidence pack.

Store terms and conditions are the written rules a customer agrees to when they buy from your Shopify store: what you sell, how you deliver, what happens when something goes wrong, and how disputes are handled. In a chargeback they are one of the few documents you control completely. Done well, they show the customer was told what to expect. Done badly, they can hand the customer an argument. The ACCC's 2025 review of more than 2,000 Australian retail websites found plenty of the second kind. This guide shows you what to include, what to remove, and how to make your terms useful the day a dispute lands.

This guide is for you if:

You run a Shopify store in Australia and your terms were copied from a template or another site.
You have lost a dispute because your policy was vague, missing or contradicted by your own pages.
You want terms that are lawful, readable and ready to be attached to a response.

Last updated: 9 October 2026. Written by the ChargeFix team. Reviewed against sources on 9 October 2026.

The 30-second answer (TL;DR)

The ACCC's February 2025 sweep covered return policies and terms and conditions on more than 2,000 Australian retail websites and flagged time limits on faulty returns, blanket "no refund" on sale or specialised items, manufacturer warranties as the only remedy, non-refundable delivery fees on faulty items, and restocking fees on faulty returns.
Consumer guarantees cannot be removed by a business's statements or warranties. Terms that purport to exclude or limit them are void, according to a law firm's summary of the sweep.
Your terms are evidence. Shopify's chargeback reasons page suggests refund and return policies, and proof the customer was informed, for credit not processed.
Good terms are short, specific, dated and visible before payment. Cover products, pricing, delivery, returns, faults, cancellations, privacy and contact details.
Keep faults and change of mind separate. Anything you offer as a policy must be honoured.
Save a dated copy of each version of your terms. You need to show what applied on the order date.
Files submitted to Shopify must be PDF, JPEG or PNG, up to 2 MB each and 4 MB total, with no links.

Quick note: The goal is not to write terms that win every argument. It is to write terms that match the law, match your practice, and can be read in a minute. A short, honest set of terms beats a long, aggressive one in front of a bank, and it beats it in front of a regulator.

Terms that help and terms that hurt

Area	Helps in a dispute	Hurts in a dispute
Faults	Remedy as the law requires, how to contact you	Fixed time limit for reporting faults
Change of mind	Clear window and conditions	Vague "at our discretion"
Sale and custom items	Limits change of mind only	"Sale items cannot be returned"
Delivery	Realistic estimates, authority to leave explained	Guaranteed dates you cannot meet
Warranty	Offered in addition to the law	Manufacturer warranty as the only remedy
Fees	Clear, lawful, disclosed	Restocking or processing fees on faults
Visibility	Linked at checkout, dated	Buried in the footer

What do store terms and conditions need to cover?

There is no single list that makes terms complete, and we are not offering legal advice. But for an online store selling physical goods, a useful set covers the following areas.

1. Who you are and how to reach you

Your trading name, ABN, contact email and a response time. This sounds basic, but a customer who cannot find a way to contact you will contact their bank.

2. What you sell and how you describe it

Say that product descriptions and photos are accurate to the best of your knowledge, and that minor colour variation can occur between screens. This does not excuse a significant difference. The ACCC page we read lists "significantly different from description or sample" as a major problem. See our guide on not as described disputes.

3. Pricing and payment

State that prices are in A$, whether GST is included, and when payment is taken. If you offer pre-orders or backorders, say how payment works. Our post on pre-order and backorder refunds covers that.

4. Delivery

Give realistic delivery estimates, say who the carrier is, and explain what happens if a parcel is lost or delayed. If you allow authority to leave or safe drop, explain how it works. Our guides on authority to leave and lost parcels explain why this matters.

5. Returns and refunds

Split into two parts: faults and change of mind. This is the section a bank will read first. See below for wording.

6. Cancellations

Say when a customer can cancel and what happens after dispatch. If production has started, say so.

7. Privacy and data

A short statement and a link to your privacy policy.

8. Changes to the terms

Say that the terms that apply are those in force on the date of the order, and keep an archive.

How should the returns section be written?

Write it for the customer who has a problem and the reviewer who will read it later. Put the fault section first.

Faulty, unsafe or not as described. If your item is faulty, unsafe or significantly different from how we described it, you are entitled to a repair, replacement or refund under the Australian Consumer Law. Contact us with your order number and a photo. You do not need the original packaging. If a fault is confirmed, we will cover reasonable return costs.

Changed your mind. You can return unused items in their original condition within 30 days of delivery for a refund to your original payment method. Sale and made to order items are not eligible for change of mind returns.

This wording matches what the ACCC says on its repair, replace, refund, cancel page: you must offer a repair, replacement or refund when a guarantee fails, you cannot send the customer to the manufacturer, customers do not need original packaging, and you must reimburse reasonable return costs if a fault is confirmed. It also honours the page's statement that change of mind is not covered by the guarantees, but any policy you offer must be honoured. Our guides on writing a refund policy and change of mind refunds go deeper.

Which lines should you delete?

Search your terms for these patterns and remove or rewrite them. Each corresponds to a concern the ACCC raised in its 2025 sweep.

Pattern	Problem	Fix
"Claims must be made within 30 days" for faults	Time limit on faulty returns	Limit only the change of mind window
"Sale items cannot be returned, exchanged or refunded"	Blanket ban on sale items	Limit to change of mind, add fault sentence
"Made to order products cannot be returned"	Blanket ban on specialised items	Same
"Items that have been opened and used cannot be exchanged or refunded"	Excludes faults found in use	Limit to change of mind
"Contact the manufacturer for warranty claims"	Sends customer elsewhere	Handle faults directly
"Delivery fees are non-refundable"	Applies to faulty items too	State that fees are refunded when a fault is confirmed
"Restocking fee of 15%"	Applied to faulty returns	Remove or limit to change of mind
"Customer pays return postage"	Applies to faulty returns	Cover reasonable costs for confirmed faults

What happened to retailers who kept those lines?

The ACCC's sweep ended with warning letters to several businesses, and the ACCC says most changed or removed the statements. It announced no penalties in the sweep itself. Elsewhere, the ACCC reports that Koala & Tree Pty Ltd paid A$56,340 under three infringement notices in November 2024, including for claiming a 72 hour limit on remedies for faulty products. And in March 2024 the ACCC started Federal Court proceedings against Mosaic Brands Limited, alleging among other things that eight of its websites said refunds for faulty products were available only if requested within six months of purchase. Those are allegations, and Mosaic said it would defend the claim. The ACCC commissioner said consumer guarantees "don't have a specific expiry date".

We include these not to alarm you but to show the pattern: time limits on fault claims are the wording regulators notice.

Why do store terms and conditions fail in disputes?

When store terms and conditions let a merchant down, it is usually for one of five reasons, and none of them is exotic.

They are missing. The store has no dated record of what applied on the order date.
They contradict the law. A blanket "no refunds" line is the classic example, and it is the pattern the ACCC sweep drew attention to.
They contradict the merchant's own pages. The product page promises one thing, the terms another.
They were never seen. Buried in a footer, never linked at checkout, never mentioned in the confirmation email.
They were not followed. The terms promise a reply in a day and the merchant took a week.

Notice that only the second is about legal content. The rest are about process. A store with simple, lawful store terms and conditions and a tidy archive will usually beat a store with sophisticated terms and no records.

Illustration: a 20 minute audit

Set a timer for 20 minutes and work through your own terms:

Minute	Task	What you are looking for
0 to 5	Read the returns section	Any time limit on faults, any "no refund" line, any restocking fee
5 to 10	Compare with three product pages	Contradictions on windows, postage, conditions
10 to 15	Check checkout and confirmation email	Is the return policy visible before payment?
15 to 18	Check the archive	Can you produce the version that applied three months ago?
18 to 20	List fixes	Rewrite, relink, archive

Most stores find at least two issues in the first pass. Fixing them costs an hour and removes the wording the ACCC sweep highlighted.

What should a sample set of store terms and conditions look like?

Below is a skeleton you can adapt. It is illustrative and not legal advice. Placeholders show where your details go.

Delivery. We dispatch orders within [X] business days and use [carrier]. Delivery estimates are a guide and not a guarantee. If your parcel is late or lost, contact us and we will investigate with the carrier. If you ask us to leave your parcel in a safe place, you authorise the carrier to do so, and we will provide the delivery record on request.

Cancellations. You can cancel before we dispatch your order by emailing us. If we have already dispatched, you may return it under our returns section below.

Warranty. Our goods come with guarantees that cannot be excluded under the Australian Consumer Law. Any manufacturer warranty is in addition to those rights.

Contact. [Business name], ABN [number], [email], we reply within one business day.

Two things to notice. The delivery paragraph explains authority to leave in the same place a customer will look for it, which is useful when a "not received" claim follows. The warranty paragraph does the opposite of what the ACCC flagged: it presents the manufacturer's warranty as an addition to, not a replacement for, the customer's rights.

How do store terms and conditions interact with your return policy?

Your return policy is part of your terms, but many stores treat it as a separate page and let the two drift apart. Pick one source of truth. Either the policy lives inside the terms, or the terms link to the policy and say it forms part of them. Then make sure the product pages, checkout and emails quote it exactly rather than paraphrase.

A paraphrase is where contradictions begin. "Easy 30 day returns" on a banner and "14 days, unused, original packaging" in the policy is a dispute waiting to happen. The ACCC says a change of mind policy you offer must be honoured, and a customer will hold you to the more generous version.

What about a separate shipping policy?

If you publish a separate shipping policy, treat it the same way. It should say who the carrier is, how long you expect delivery to take, what happens with authority to leave and what you do with lost parcels. The ACCC named delivery timeframes as a 2024/25 priority, and its proceedings against Mosaic alleged that several hundred thousand products were not delivered within advertised timeframes. Those are allegations, but they show regulators care about what stores promise on delivery. If you cannot meet a delivery estimate, change the estimate.

How do store terms and conditions support a "credit not processed" response?

This reason code is one of the most common for returns and refunds. The customer says they returned something or cancelled, and did not receive a credit. Shopify suggests refund and return policies, proof the customer was informed, emails, an explanation or proof of an earlier refund.

Your terms support three parts of that:

The policy itself, showing the window, conditions and how refunds are made.
Proof the customer was informed, such as the confirmation email linking to the policy.
The explanation, which is a short timeline referring to the policy.

If the dispute is a credit not processed claim and the customer did not follow the return steps, your terms plus your records answer it. If the customer did follow the steps and you did not refund, no wording will help, and the right move is to refund before an inquiry becomes a chargeback. Remember that a full refund ends an inquiry, a partial refund does not, and an open chargeback cannot be refunded. Our guide to chargeback vs inquiry explains the timing.

How do your terms work as evidence in a Shopify dispute?

When a customer files a chargeback, Shopify tells you the reason, and you respond with evidence. For credit not processed, Shopify's reasons page suggests refund and return policies, proof the customer was informed, emails, an explanation, or proof of an earlier refund. For product unacceptable, it suggests fulfilment details, tracking, product descriptions and photos, and proof the customer did not try to return the item or that a replacement was sent.

Your terms support both. They are the "refund and return policy" in the first case and part of the "proof the customer was informed" in the second. But they only work if you can show three things:

What the terms said on the order date. A dated copy.
Where the customer saw them. A screenshot of the checkout, product page or confirmation email that links to them.
That you followed them. The order timeline shows you did what the terms say.

If the terms were changed after the order, or you cannot show where they appeared, they are weak evidence.

The deadline and the format

The deadline is usually 7 to 21 days after filing, in your store timezone, and 11:59 PM if no time is shown. Shopify auto-submits what you have on the due date. Files must be PDF, JPEG or PNG, up to 2 MB each and 4 MB in total, with one file per evidence type and no links. So a 12 page legal document pasted from a template is a poor attachment. Save the relevant section as a short PDF, with the date at the top. Our evidence checklist lists everything else.

Illustration: the same A$200 dispute with two sets of terms

	Store A: short, lawful, dated terms	Store B: long template, contradictory
Customer says refund not processed	Policy page, dated, shows change of mind window	Policy says "no refunds"
Evidence	Policy, order confirmation link, emails	Policy contradicts consumer guarantees
Strength	Strong if the customer missed the window	Weak, may help the customer
If you lose	A$200 plus A$25 fee	A$200 plus A$25 fee
Other risk	Low	Wording the ACCC flagged

The dollar loss is the same if you lose. The difference is the chance of winning and the other exposure. We could not verify how an issuer weighs one policy against another, so treat the table as a description of risk rather than a prediction.

Where should your terms appear?

Visibility matters as much as wording. A customer cannot be said to have been informed of something they could not find.

Footer link to the policy page, on every page.
Product page near the add to cart button, for the returns summary.
Checkout with a link or short statement.
Order confirmation email with the key policy points and a link.
Packing slip, if you ship with one, with a short returns note.

Save screenshots of each placement, dated. If you use Shopify's policy pages or apps to add them, the exact admin steps change over time and we could not verify them, so check your own admin.

How do you keep store terms and conditions from drifting?

Terms rot. Products change, carriers change, and a clause that was true last year is wrong now. Put these habits in place.

Date every version. Keep a changelog with the date and a one line summary.

Archive old versions. A dispute may arrive months after the order, and CHOICE reports the Visa window can run from the expected delivery date, with a 540 day outer limit. NAB gives cardholders up to 120 days for Visa and Mastercard disputes and 210 days for eftpos.

Review quarterly. Read the whole thing as a customer. Delete anything you would not say to their face.

Align with practice. If your terms promise a 24 hour reply and your average is three days, change one of them.

Check apps. Returns apps, review apps and shipping apps may add their own wording. Make sure it does not contradict yours.

Who should own the terms in your business?

Give one person the job. In a small team that is usually the owner, who reads the terms every quarter and signs off any change. In a larger team it may be whoever runs support. The owner's tasks are simple: keep the archive, keep the wording consistent across pages and emails, and brief anyone who answers customers. When a new app, a new carrier or a new product line arrives, the owner checks whether the terms still describe reality. This small habit is what separates store terms and conditions that work in a dispute from ones that only look good on the day they were written.

How do you write terms a customer can actually read?

Short sentences, plain words and headings that match the questions customers ask: "What if my order arrives damaged?" and "Can I return something I don't want?" will outperform "Remedies and liability". Aim for terms a customer can read in two minutes.

Avoid legal sounding phrases that add nothing, such as "to the fullest extent permitted by law" attached to a clause that excludes liability. The ACCC page says "no refund" signs and terms do not override consumer rights, so a clause that tries to is not just unhelpful. It can be the exact wording a regulator or a bank reviewer notices.

If you want a lawyer to review them, do it. The point of this guide is to show the issues to raise, not to replace advice. We could not verify every area of Australian consumer law that might touch your terms, such as unfair contract term rules, so ask about those directly.

What's different for Australian merchants?

The guarantees cannot be contracted out of. The ACCC says "no refund" signs and terms do not override consumer rights, and relying on them for faulty goods is illegal.

The regulator has looked at this. The 2025 sweep covered more than 2,000 retail sites, and delivery timeframes were named as a 2024/25 priority.

Consumers have an escalation path. Consumer Affairs Victoria says customers can go to AFCA if their bank rejects a chargeback request, and that chargeback limits run from 45 to 120 days by provider.

Fees in A$. The dispute fee is A$25, and every dispute counts toward your chargeback rate. A high rate can lead to an account health notice, a reserve or NDRP enrolment, with an NDRP fee of A$25 in Australia.

Dates. Write dates in full, such as "terms version dated 9 October 2026".

Finally, test your terms on someone outside the business. Hand them the returns section and ask two questions: "What would you do if your order arrived broken?" and "What would you do if you simply didn't like it?" If they answer both correctly without help, the terms are clear enough. If they hesitate, rewrite the part they stumbled over. A thirty second test with a friend is cheaper than a lost dispute, and it shows you the page as a customer, or a bank reviewer, would read it.

Common mistakes

Copying another store's terms

You inherit their mistakes, and their promises. Write your own.

Writing a time limit for fault claims

It is the wording the ACCC and the Mosaic proceedings put in the spotlight.

Contradicting your product pages

If the terms say 30 days and the product page says 14, the customer will use the better one.

Hiding the terms

If the customer cannot find them, they cannot be said to have been informed.

Not archiving

You need to show what applied on the order date.

Over-long terms

A reviewer will not read ten pages. Lead with returns and faults.

Forgetting apps

A returns app may display different wording from your terms.

What we could not verify

Whether any specific term in your store is unlawful. That needs legal advice.
How a card issuer weighs a store policy against a customer's account.
Unfair contract term rules as they apply to your terms.
Penalty amounts for particular clauses beyond the infringement notice reported for a 72 hour limit.
Shopify's current admin steps for policy pages and checkout links.
State or territory differences, and anything beyond the ACCC page of 21 July 2026 and the February 2025 sweep.
The outcome of the Mosaic proceedings, which we know only as allegations and a stated intention to defend.

Where a decision depends on one of these, ask a lawyer or the ACCC and keep the reply on file.

Frequently asked questions

What should be in store terms and conditions for an Australian Shopify store?

Cover who you are and how to contact you, what you sell, pricing and payment, delivery, returns split into faults and change of mind, cancellations, privacy and changes to the terms. Keep them short, dated and visible before payment. Have a lawyer review them if you can.

Can my terms say customers have 30 days to report a fault?

The ACCC flagged time limits for returning faulty products as potentially misleading. The ACCC commissioner has said consumer guarantees do not have a specific expiry date. Put a window on change of mind returns if you wish, and leave fault claims without a fixed cutoff.

Do my terms override the consumer guarantees?

No. The ACCC says "no refund" signs and terms do not override consumer rights, and a law firm's summary of its sweep says terms that purport to exclude or limit a guarantee are void, with limited exceptions. Write terms that match the law instead of fighting it.

Can I make customers pay return postage?

For change of mind returns you can decide and state it clearly. For confirmed faults, the ACCC says you must reimburse reasonable return costs. The ACCC flagged requiring customers to pay delivery on returns of faulty goods as a concern.

Can I charge a restocking fee?

The ACCC flagged restocking and processing fees on faulty returns as a concern. For change of mind returns, we could not verify a rule on restocking fees, so state any fee clearly before purchase and apply it consistently. Do not apply it to faults.

Are my terms useful as evidence in a Shopify dispute?

Yes, if they are dated, visible and followed. Shopify suggests refund and return policies and proof the customer was informed for credit not processed. Submit the relevant section as a short PDF, with a screenshot showing where the customer saw it.

How long should I keep old versions of my terms?

Long enough to cover the dispute window. NAB gives cardholders up to 120 days for Visa and Mastercard disputes and 210 days for eftpos, and CHOICE reports a Visa window that can run from the expected delivery date with a 540 day outer limit. Keep versions for at least that long.

Should I put terms at checkout?

Yes. A customer who sees a short summary and link at checkout has been informed in a way a footer link alone does not show. Save a dated screenshot of the checkout, because Shopify's admin steps change and a screenshot is your proof.

Do I need a lawyer to write my terms?

You are not required to have one, but terms affect your legal position, so review by a lawyer is sensible, especially for unfair contract terms and your particular products. This guide covers returns, faults and disputes. It is not legal advice.

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