ZAMBO.

Direct answer

A partial refund is a split, and a split needs prices per part. No prices, no refund math.

The request sounds reasonable on its face: the client liked most of the work, one part missed or is no longer needed, so refund that part and they keep the rest. It goes wrong in the arithmetic. Without a per part price, the refund becomes a feeling, usually calculated as a round share of the whole fee, while the part they keep using quietly includes pieces of the part you refunded. This page gives you the fair version: price the job part by part from the agreement and the delivery record, separate a genuine defect from a change of mind, refund only what is genuinely returned and stops being used, and write the settlement so the rights in each part follow the money, kept parts stay licensed and paid, refunded parts stop being used.

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Updated November 12, 2026. First published November 12, 2026. The records quoted below are real and public, read back from the live service on November 12, 2026.

Step 1. Break the job into parts and price each part before discussing a number

Never negotiate the refund as a percentage of the whole. First rebuild the job as a list of parts: the deliverables or stages the client received, in the order they were delivered. Then put a value next to each part from the materials that already exist: the quote or proposal if it priced stages separately, the milestones if the job was billed in parts, or your own time and delivery record if it was one flat fee. Where the original price was genuinely flat, price the parts by their share of the work as delivered, and say plainly that this is how the split is being calculated. Send the client that list before any refund figure: these are the parts, this is what each was worth, this is the part under discussion. Most partial refund arguments shrink at this step, because the argument was never really about a number; it was about the job being one blurry lump in which any refund could be any size. A priced list makes the refund a line item, and line items can be agreed.

Step 2. Sort the reason: defect, changed scope, or changed mind

The same refund request deserves three different answers depending on why the part is being handed back. If the part is genuinely defective, it does not do what was agreed, the first remedy is fixing it, and if it cannot be fixed, refunding that part is fair and the client should stop using it, including any half working version. If the scope changed mid job and the part was built to an earlier brief the client then replaced, the work was still done as instructed; a refund is a goodwill choice, not an obligation, and trading it for something, a credit against the replacement work, is reasonable. If the client simply changed their mind or their plans moved, the delivered and accepted part was bought and received; many suppliers decline a refund there or offer a partial credit as a relationship decision. Name which case you are in, in writing, in one sentence, before money moves. The case decides what is fair, and agreeing the case first stops the negotiation from treating a change of mind with the urgency of a defect.

Step 3. Use the delivery and acceptance record to draw the kept and refunded line

A partial settlement stands or falls on one question: which parts were actually delivered and accepted, and which of those is the client keeping? That is a record question, not a memory question. 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 the per step structure the line is drawn from:

Accepted: the decision is on the record

Pending: checked, and still waiting on a decision

Read the structure, not just the totals: a job as separate steps, each with its own receipt, and one acceptance decision over them. In a partial dispute you redraw that list at part level: delivered, accepted, kept, and in use are the parts that stay paid; the refunded part is named just as precisely, with its own delivery state shown. The pending record shows why acceptance matters to the split: a part the client never accepted and never used is the easiest refund to agree, while a part that was accepted and has been in use for weeks is a purchase being returned after consumption, which is a different conversation and should be priced as one.

Step 4. Write the settlement so rights follow the money

When a figure is agreed, the refund is not finished until one short written settlement exists, confirmed by both sides. It needs five lines: the part being refunded, named exactly as on your priced list; the refund amount and how and when it is paid; the statement that the kept parts remain fully paid and the client keeps the agreed rights in them; the statement that the refunded part is returned, meaning the client stops using it, takes it out of anything live, and does not pass it to anyone else; and the date from which the use stops. That last pair of lines is the whole point of writing it down. Without them, the common ending is a refund paid and the refunded part still running in the clients product a month later, discovered by accident, with no document saying it should have stopped. With them, continued use after the date is a simple, provable breach of a settlement both sides confirmed, which is a much shorter conversation than re-arguing the original job.

Step 5. If they keep using a refunded part, treat it as unpaid use, on its own

Give the settlement a check date, two or four weeks out, and actually check the places the refunded part would appear: the live site, the published document, the product, the campaign. If it is still in use, write once, promptly, with the settlement attached: the part named in the settlement of this date is still in use at this place as of today; the choices are to stop the use by this date or to pay the part price from the agreed list, which reinstates it as a kept part. Keep that letter separate from the original refund; it is not a reopening of the whole job, it is enforcement of a split the client already agreed. Most cases end at the letter, because the continued use is usually an internal handover failure at the client, a file nobody removed, rather than a plan. The written settlement is what lets you be relaxed about that: the facts and the remedy are already agreed, so the letter can be short, factual, and final.

What this page cannot settle

This page cannot tell you what consumer or contract law in your place says about refunds for your kind of work; rights to cancel, cooling off rules for some buyers, and defective services law vary, and this is general information, not legal advice. It also cannot price a job whose parts were never separately described; the split in step 1 is then your honest reconstruction, and a client can reasonably argue it, which is why the list goes to them for agreement before money moves. A verifiable receipt proves the saved result was not changed since it was saved; it does not prove a part was good or worth its price. What the record settles is delivery and acceptance per part, which is the factual floor every refund split is calculated from.

Frequently asked questions

My client wants a refund for part of the work but wants to keep using the rest. What do I do?

Split the job before you split the money. List the parts of the work as delivered, price each part from the quote, the milestones, or its share of the work, and send that list to the client first. Then sort the reason: a genuinely defective part that cannot be fixed is fairly refunded and must stop being used; a part replaced by a scope change was still built as instructed, so a credit against the replacement is the reasonable shape; a pure change of mind over delivered, accepted, in use work is a relationship decision, not an automatic refund. Whatever figure is agreed, close it with a short written settlement: the refunded part named, the amount, the kept parts confirmed as paid with their rights intact, the refunded parts use stopped from a stated date. Refund only what is returned in that real sense, and the arrangement stays fair in both directions.

How do I work out what one part of a flat fee job was worth?

Reconstruct it from the evidence of the work itself, in this order of strength. If the proposal or emails priced any stages, options, or extras, those figures govern the parts they cover. If billing was by milestone, the milestone amounts are the part prices. If neither exists, split the fee by the share of the delivered work: time recorded, size or complexity of each deliverable, and the order the client valued them, and show your working in the list you send. The aim is not a figure nobody can question; it is a figure with a stated method the client can agree or argue line by line. What does not work is the clients shortcut, a round percentage of the whole fee chosen because it feels proportionate, because feelings price the kept parts too, and those are not in dispute.

The client says the part is defective. Do I have to refund it?

A part that genuinely does not do what was agreed has to be made right, and making it right comes before refunding it: offer the fix first, with a date, because a fixed part is usually worth more to the client than its price back. If it cannot be fixed, or the client reasonably refuses a fix after a real failure, refunding that parts price is the fair outcome, paired with the client stopping its use. Judge the defect claim against the record: what was briefed, what was delivered per step, and what was accepted at the time. A part that passed acceptance and has been in live use is not automatically defective because priorities changed; that is the changed mind case wearing a defects clothes, and it is priced differently. This is general information, not legal advice; defective services law varies by place.

Can the client keep using the refunded part if they credit me or mention me?

Not under the settlement this page describes, and credit is not payment unless you agree in writing that it is, at a value you set. The principle is that a refund unwinds the purchase of that part: the money goes back, so the rights go back, and use stops. If the client wants to keep using the part, the honest shape is not a refund at all; it is a price reduction on a part they keep, negotiated as its own smaller number with the rights confirmed in writing. Keep the two shapes visibly separate in your messages, refund and return, or discount and keep, because a muddle between them is how a supplier ends up having refunded in full for work that is still earning the client money.

How does a per part record change a partial refund argument?

It gives the split a factual floor. When the work runs through Zambo, every step lands on the job record with a verifiable receipt under AER-1, published as IETF Internet-Draft draft-zambo-aer1-26, the client accepts on that record, and the acceptance view shows status, decider, date, and release state, so which parts were delivered, checked, and accepted is readable at a link instead of reconstructed from chat. New users get 20 calls and 1 wrap-up free every day per agent, and picking up work in another AI is always free. For $0.99, run your next multi part job on one record, priced part by part in the agreement, so if a partial refund is ever asked for, the kept and refunded line is already drawn: get the Day Pass. A Day Pass is unlimited for 24 hours, no subscription. Ongoing use is the Zambo Pass at $29 a month, $19 a month for $ZAMBO holders, or Lifetime at $250 one time.

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