ZAMBO.

Direct answer

They paid a deposit. They cancelled. The answer is an accounting, not an argument.

A deposit dispute feels personal, but it is really three separate amounts wearing one label: the work you already did, the time you held and could not sell to anyone else, and the part of the project that never happened. Only the third amount is even arguably theirs to take back. Here is how to split the deposit into those three amounts, state the split in writing, and set terms next time that make the answer automatic.

See the instrument first: the live demo runs one real call and hands you its verifiable receipt, no signup.

Updated October 25, 2026. The two delivery records quoted below are real and public, with their client decision states read back from the live service on publication day.

Step 1. Start with what the agreement said the deposit was for

Find the words, wherever they live: the proposal, the booking message, the invoice the deposit paid. Deposits do different jobs. Some buy the first stage of work outright. Some hold dates in your calendar. Some are simply the first slice of the total price. The cancellation answer follows from which job your deposit was doing, and from whether the words non refundable, or any cancellation terms, were stated before the money moved. If the agreement is silent, do not invent terms now. Work the accounting in the next steps honestly, because an honest accounting is what holds up with the client, with a platform, and with anyone else who reads it later.

Step 2. Account for the work already done, at the agreed prices

List what the deposit already bought before the cancellation arrived: the calls, the planning, the first drafts, the stage partly or fully delivered. Price each item the way the agreement priced the work, no inflated reconstruction and no apology discount. If a stage was delivered and accepted, say so with its date. Work that was done and delivered is not refunded in any honest accounting; it was bought and received. This list is also your protection against the framing that nothing happened so everything comes back. Something did happen, it has dates, and it is item one in the statement you are about to send.

Step 3. Account for the time you held and turned away

A deposit also buys your calendar. State the held period plainly: the dates reserved, the start date you committed to, and any work you declined or could not take because the slot was spoken for. The record format is AER-1, published as an IETF Internet-Draft (draft-zambo-aer1-26), and each step carries a verifiable receipt: a receipt proves the saved result was not changed since it was saved. The two public records below show how states stay readable when they are kept this way:

Accepted: the decision is on the record

Pending: checked, and still waiting on a decision

An accepted record, 4 of 4 steps checked, decided_by client, release_hint ok_to_release, is time and work whose state is closed. A pending record, 5 of 5 steps checked and release_hint hold, is the honest picture of held work waiting on a decision, which is exactly what a reserved project slot is until it starts or dies. You may not be able to price held time to the penny, and you should say what it is rather than dress it up: a real cost the deposit existed to cover, sized by the length of the hold and how late the cancellation came.

Step 4. Refund what is genuinely unearned, promptly and in writing

Whatever is left after the work done and the held time is the unearned part, and the strong move is to offer it back without being chased. Send one statement: the deposit received on this date, the work completed itemized at this amount, the held period stated, and the balance being returned by this date, or the balance still owed if the work already done exceeds the deposit. A statement like that ends most deposit disputes on the spot, because it answers the only fair question, what did the money buy, with numbers the client can check. Refusing to return a clearly unearned balance, by contrast, converts a cancellation into a grievance that follows your name around.

Step 5. If the client demands everything back, answer the accounting, not the demand

Keep the reply short and attached to the statement: here is what was delivered and accepted, here is the time held, here is the balance already on its way back. Do not debate what a deposit means in the abstract, and do not trade accusations about who cancelled on whom. If the agreement named the deposit non refundable and the client accepted those terms before paying, say that once, with the date they accepted, and still show the accounting underneath it; terms plus arithmetic is a much stronger position than terms alone. If the amount is large and the client threatens formal steps, that is the point to stop writing essays and take the statement to a local lawyer for one review.

Step 6. Write the deposit terms that answer this before it happens again

Four lines in the next proposal prevent the whole episode: the deposit amount and what it covers, that it secures the start date and the first stage, what happens on cancellation at each point (before work starts, mid stage, after a stage is accepted), and how any unearned balance is returned and by when. Clients sign it without blinking because it is visibly fair in both directions. Then run the project in stages that get accepted as they land, so at any cancellation date the accounting already exists: what was delivered, what was decided, and what state the money is in, without a reconstruction project at the worst possible moment.

What a record does not settle

A verifiable receipt proves the saved result was not changed since it was saved; it does not decide whether a deposit is refundable under your agreement or local rules, does not price the time you held, and cannot return or keep anyone's money. The agreement words, the itemized work, and the held dates are what the answer stands on. This page is general information, not legal advice.

Frequently asked questions

My client paid a deposit and then cancelled the project. Do I have to give the deposit back?

Usually not all of it, and the honest answer is an accounting rather than a yes or no. Split the deposit into three amounts: the work already done and delivered before the cancellation, priced as the agreement priced it; the time you held in your calendar and could not sell to anyone else; and whatever is left, which is genuinely unearned. The unearned balance is the part to return, promptly and with a written statement showing the split. If your agreement stated the deposit was non refundable and the client accepted that before paying, say so with the acceptance date, and still show the accounting underneath. What you should never do is keep the whole deposit by reflex or return the whole deposit by reflex. Both skip the only question that matters: what did the money buy?

What if my agreement never said whether the deposit was refundable?

Then the accounting does the work the missing clause should have done. Itemize the work completed and any stage delivered and accepted, state the dates you held and what the hold cost you in turned away work, and return the balance that is plainly unearned. That is the split a fair reader, a platform reviewer, or a court would look for, and offering it first puts you in the strongest position available. Treat the gap as a drafting lesson: the next proposal states in four lines what the deposit covers, what happens on cancellation at each stage, and how an unearned balance comes back. Silence in the paperwork is what turned this cancellation into a negotiation.

The client cancelled before I started any work. Is the deposit all theirs?

Mostly, with one honest exception. If no work was done, the work done line is zero. What remains is the hold: how long the dates sat reserved, how close to the start the cancellation arrived, and whether you turned other work away for the slot. A cancellation weeks ahead, with the slot easily refilled, points to returning nearly everything. A cancellation the day before a held start, after other work was declined, is what a booking deposit exists for, and keeping some or all of it can be the fair answer, especially if the terms said so when the money was taken. Show the dates either way. The hold is a claim about time, and time claims live or die on dates.

How do I tell the client I am keeping part of the deposit without starting a fight?

Send a statement, not a verdict. One page: deposit received and its date, work completed itemized with delivery dates, the held period, the balance being returned and its date, all in flat language with no adjectives about anyone's behavior. People argue with conclusions; they rarely argue with arithmetic they can check line by line. Offer the unearned part back in the same message, unprompted. Keeping a documented share while visibly returning the rest reads as professional. Keeping everything with no accounting reads as a windfall, and it is the version of this story the client will tell other people.

How do I run deposits and stages so the accounting already exists?

Take the deposit against a named first stage, deliver stages as handovers the client checks and accepts, and let the state of the money follow the state of the work. When the work runs through Zambo, every step carries a verifiable receipt under AER-1, published as IETF Internet-Draft draft-zambo-aer1-26, so a cancellation on any date meets a record that already shows what was delivered, what was accepted, and what is still pending. New users get 20 free calls per day, then they upgrade when the job needs more. For $0.99, run the next booked job that way and let the record do the accounting: get the Day Pass. A Day Pass covers 24 hours, no subscription. Ongoing use is the Zambo Pass at $29 a month or $290 a year, and $19 a month for $ZAMBO holders, which adds private handover links, your branding, and the approval record as PDF and JSON files.

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