At Brindlechute, we understand that plans change. This guide outlines how refunds and fees are handled across common scenarios: booking changes, outright cancellations, and charge reversals.
1. Booking Change
Scenario:
A customer modifies their booking, such as reducing from 2 boats to 1, which decreases the total cost.
Refund Handling:
Outfitter discretion: The outfitter decides the refund amount to the customer based on the change.
Immediate debit: Brindlechute debits the outfitter immediately to ensure the customer receives their refund promptly.
Partial refund typical: Usually, only part of the original booking amount is refunded.
Choosing not to refund the difference: If you decline to refund some or all of the price difference, Brindlechute records a Settlement — a $0 entry confirming the change happened without any funds moving. See How to Refund a Booking for the full flow.
Fees:
Brindlechute fees are not refunded. Our fees apply to the original booking, and changes are considered discretionary and often last-minute.
Stripe fees are not refunded. The Stripe processing fee on the original transaction is non-refundable.
If the outfitter covers Stripe fees, they will bear the cost of these fees on any refund.
2. Outright Cancellation
Scenario
The outfitter cancels a booking due to an error or operational issue (e.g., double booking, mistake).
Refund Handling
Customer is refunded: Either fully or partially, depending on the situation, as a courtesy and to correct the outfitter’s error.
No automatic fee refund: Brindlechute does not automatically refund platform fees, as these refunds are discretionary.
Recommendation: Outfitter may deduct Brindlechute fees when calculating the refund amount to the customer to avoid losing fee value on full cancellations.
Fees
Brindlechute fees are not refunded automatically.
Stripe fees are not refunded. Stripe processing fees remain non-refundable.
If the outfitter wants to make the customer whole, they are responsible for covering these fees.
3. Charge Reversal (Rebill with Correction)
Scenario
Situations requiring a refund and a corrected recharge, such as:
Customer booked with the wrong credit card (e.g., personal instead of business).
Booking details changed, requiring a price correction.
Refund Handling
Full refund for original charge.
New charge processed with corrected details.
Fees
Stripe fees are not refunded. Original transaction fees are non-refundable.
Brindlechute fees are refunded in this case. This is the only scenario where we fully return our fee to the outfitter to avoid double-charging.
Summary Table: Refunds & Fees Overview
Refund Type | Customer Gets Back | Brindlechute Fee | Stripe Fee |
Booking Change | Partial or full (outfitter decides) | Not refunded | Not refunded |
Outright Cancellation | Partial or full depending on cancellation policy | Not refunded by default | Not refunded |
Charge Reversal | Full (refunded & recharged) | Refunded (expected recharge) | Not refunded |
Key Notes
Outfitters have discretion over refund amounts in most cases, except charge reversals.
Brindlechute platform fees are only refunded in charge reversal scenarios.
Fees are calculated on the amount collected in each transaction. When rebooking a client after a cancellation, applying their prior payment as a booking discount means fees apply only to any remaining balance collected — not to the amount already paid.
Stripe processing fees are never refunded by Stripe — outfitters should plan for this in their policies.
Brindlechute does not charge a fee for the account debit that funds a client refund. This applies to all refunds, full or partial.