Refunds

A refund returns money to a backer for a pledge that was already paid. Ignition Crowdfunding treats a refund as a record in its own right, separate from the pledge’s status — so a refunded pledge keeps an honest history of what was collected and what flowed back.

A refund is not a status

The most important thing to understand: a refund never changes a pledge’s lifecycle status. A pledge that was paid stays Succeeded even after it is fully refunded, because the payment genuinely did succeed — money was collected. The refund is shown as a separate dimension:

The status badge always shows the lifecycle state: Pending, Succeeded, or Canceled.
A refund appears as a neutral chip beside the badge, reading Partial Refund or Full Refund.
The pledge’s net contribution reflects the money that remains after the refund.

This is the same on every surface — the wp-admin Pledges screen, the backer’s dashboard, a campaign’s management view, and the CSV exports — so “Status means lifecycle, chip means refund” holds everywhere.

Partial vs full

A partial refund returns part of the collected amount. The chip reads Partial Refund and the net is the pledged amount minus what was returned.
A full refund returns the entire amount. The chip reads Full Refund and the net is $0.00. For a card payment, the processor keeps its fee even on a full refund, so the net can land just below zero — see When a refund leaves you below zero.

Both are still Succeeded pledges — partial and full refunds are presented symmetrically.

Issuing a refund

Staff issue refunds from Ignition → Pledges — either from a pledge’s row actions in the list or from the pledge detail page. Choose Issue refund on a Succeeded pledge: the dialog asks for the amount in your currency, prefilled with the full remaining refundable amount (lower it for a partial refund), and optionally a reason. A confirmation is required before the refund is recorded.

The Issue refund action is only offered while something remains to refund — once the full amount has been refunded, or a pending refund already covers the remainder, the action disappears. After a refund on the list page, the pledge row updates in place with the new refund chip, net amount, and available actions.

Issuing refunds is a staff-only action: administrators and operators.

When a partial refund is refused

If an add-on let the backer add something on top of their pledge — a tip, or covering a fee — the charge is larger than the pledge, and a partial refund cannot be attributed: there is no way for the site to know which of those dollars you meant to return. Rather than guess, it refuses, with the message “This payment includes voluntary additions, so a partial refund cannot be attributed. Refund the payment in full.” A full refund of the same payment is always allowed.

This never comes up on a plain install, where the charge and the pledge are the same amount.

What a refund affects

Net contribution — The pledge’s net drops by the refunded amount across every surface that shows it.
Public progress bar — The campaign’s public Pledged figure is reduced by succeeded refunds, so the bar reflects money that has flowed back. See Campaign Page — Progress bar.
Reward slots — A full refund releases the pledge’s limited-quantity reward slot so the inventory recovers automatically, the same as a cancellation. A partial refund keeps the slot claimed. See Reward Levels.
Emails — Issuing a refund sends a notification to the backer and (in the Refunds category) staff; with Platform Mode active, the campaign’s creator is notified too. See Email Notifications — Refund emails.

Where refunds appear

Surface	What it shows
wp-admin Pledges list	A Refund column with the Partial / Full chip, and a Net column.
wp-admin pledge detail	The money statement: a Returned to backer row in the “Where it went” table, and the Net left after it. A refund that has not settled yet is called out beneath the tables instead of being folded into the totals. The refund also appears in the Refunds table and the history log; if it failed, its row shows the reason reported by the payment gateway.
Backer pledge detail	The chip beside the status, the net amount, and “Refund issued” entries in the status history.
Campaign management view	The chip on the pledge row and a “refunded across N pledges” note in the funding summary.
CSV exports	A refund column and a net column — Net to Recipient on the wp-admin pledge export, Net to You on a campaign’s own export, and Net Received on the backer export. The two pledge exports also carry a Processing Fee column; the backer export does not.

Managing Pledges — The admin pledge screens where refunds are issued.
Campaign Page — How refunds affect the public progress bar.
Email Notifications — The refund notifications.