Shopify Store Policies: Returns, Shipping, What to Write

On your own store, Shopify store policies for returns, shipping, contact details, privacy and terms are yours to write, publish and honor. Shopify’s Help Center says its Terms of Service require public contact information, a refund policy and order fulfillment timelines on your store. Shopify can generate templates, but it also says you are responsible for following whatever you publish.

On Etsy, much of this was scaffolded for you. On Shopify it is a blank page plus a settings screen, and the two do not sync on their own.

Last checked: September 23, 2026. Platform settings and legal requirements change, so confirm each point on the linked pages before you rely on it. Nothing here is legal advice.

What Etsy was quietly doing for your policies

Most sellers leaving Etsy think of policies as a page they filled in once. In practice, Etsy was running a system around that page.

According to Etsy’s Help Center at the time of writing (September 2026), Etsy asks sellers outside the EU to attach a return policy to physical listings, even when the policy says no returns. Buyers receive a copy of your policies as they stood at the time of purchase in their receipt email.

Your processing profile turns into a “ship by” date for every order. And Etsy’s Purchase Protection program, under its own published terms and eligibility rules, can cover some or all of a qualifying refund so you do not pay it yourself.

None of that exists by default on Shopify:

• Nothing forces you to write a policy before you open the store.
• Nothing snapshots your policy into the buyer’s receipt unless you arrange it.
• Nothing calculates a ship-by date and holds you to it.
• There is no marketplace case system. If a buyer disputes a card charge, it goes through the card network and your payment provider, and you answer it with your own records.

This is not a reason to stay or to leave. It is a list of jobs that change hands on launch day. If you are still weighing that decision, the migration readiness checklist covers it; this article assumes you are building the store.

Which Shopify store policies you need: returns, shipping, contact and more

Shopify’s Adding store policies page in its Help Center (checked on 2026-09-23) lists six written policies you can add under Settings > Policies: return policy, privacy policy, terms of service, shipping policy, legal notice and subscription policy. Shopify’s separate Consumer protection laws page (checked on 2026-09-23) describes what its Terms of Service require of merchants.

At the time of writing, Shopify links your policies in the checkout footer, links the return policy on the order review page, and links the shipping policy on product pages and the cart. Each policy also has its own address, such as /policies/refund-policy and /policies/shipping-policy, which you can add to menus or link from other pages.

Returns: two settings that can contradict each other

This is the part the template guides tend to skip. Shopify has two places that describe your returns, and they are not connected.

The first is the written return policy: the text your customers read. The second is Return and cancellation rules, a set of settings that control what customers can actually do through self-serve returns. Shopify’s return rules help page states it plainly: “The generated policy doesn’t automatically include the return rules that you set up.”

At the time of writing (September 2026), the return rules let you set:

• a return window of 14, 30 or 90 days, unlimited, or a custom number of days
• whether the window starts from the item’s delivery or from delivery of the last item in the order
• overrides for specific collections, products or variants (where an item sits in more than one override, the shortest window wins)
• who pays return shipping: free returns, a flat fee, or the customer buys their own label
• an optional restocking fee as a percentage
• final sale items that cannot be returned (bundles cannot be set as final sale)
• cancellation rules for unfulfilled items: no cancellations, a short window of 15 minutes, 1 hour or 24 hours, or until the item is fulfilled

The same page notes that if you only write free text and never set a return window, your return details will not appear on Shop app product pages.

The method that prevents a contradiction is simple: set the rules first, write the text to match them second, then read both side by side. If the text says 30 days and the rule says 14, a customer will find the gap before you do.

If you sell to buyers in the EU

Shopify’s return rules page says that if you sell to customers in the European Union, you should set a return window of at least 14 days that starts from delivery of the last item, so customers can use their right of withdrawal. It also says EU Directive 2023/2673 requires an easy electronic way to exercise that 14-day right, taking effect on June 19, 2026. If EU buyers are a meaningful share of your orders, have a professional confirm your setup.

Translating your Etsy return settings

Etsy lets you set return policies listing by listing. Shopify starts from one store-wide rule and lets you carve out exceptions. So the translation runs in this order:

1. Find your most common Etsy return setting. That becomes your default Shopify rule.
2. List the Etsy listings that differed, usually custom or personalized items that took no returns.
3. Group those into a Shopify collection and mark it final sale, or give it its own override window.
4. Write the exceptions into the policy text by name, so the rule and the page say the same thing.

Shipping policy: the promise regulators care about

A shipping policy is more than a rates table. It is a promise about time, and time is what gets you into trouble.

Shopify’s Consumer protection laws page says that before a customer completes a purchase, it should be clear how long the order will take to arrive.

In the US, the FTC’s Business Guide to the Mail, Internet, or Telephone Order Merchandise Rule sets the baseline: you need a reasonable basis for any shipping time you state, and if you state none, you need a reasonable basis to believe you can ship within 30 days.

If you cannot ship on time, the guide says you must tell the customer, give a revised date or say it is unknown, and offer the choice to accept the delay or cancel.

On Etsy, your processing profile did this arithmetic for you. On Shopify, you write it out. A workable shipping policy covers:

• Processing time, stated separately from transit time. Carry your Etsy processing time over only if it was accurate, not optimistic.
• Methods and carriers you actually use.
• Transit estimates as ranges, per region, not a single number.
• Where you ship, and where you do not.
• International duties and import taxes: who pays, stated plainly.
• Lost, late or damaged parcels: how to report, what evidence you need, what happens next.
• Address errors: what happens if the buyer enters the wrong one.
• Made-to-order items: a separate timeline if production takes longer than stock items.

Keep the policy consistent with the rates and delivery estimates in your shipping settings. The policy text and the checkout estimates are, again, separate things you maintain by hand.

Contact information: the one that surprises home-based sellers

Shopify’s Consumer protection laws page lists what its Terms of Service require in your contact information: your business name, an email address and a phone number customers can use for questions, complaints or claims, and the physical address of your business.

If you sell into, or target consumers in, the European Economic Area, the same page adds your company number and VAT number.

On Etsy, most buyer contact ran through Etsy Messages. On your own store, a physical address appears on a public page. For sellers who work from a spare room, that is a real decision, and it deserves a conversation with an accountant or lawyer about what counts as a business address where you live. Do not solve it by leaving the address off.

Visible, specific contact details also do a second job: they are one of the trust signals a new store has to rebuild, which the guide on trust signals the marketplace supplied covers in more depth.

Privacy, terms and the templates

At the time of writing, Shopify says automated privacy settings are turned on by default for new stores, covering the privacy policy, cookie banner and data sharing opt-out page. Terms of service and the other policies can be generated from a template with “Insert template” in Settings > Policies, in English, and in French, Italian or Spanish for some policies.

Templates are a reasonable first draft. They are not a policy until you have read every line and checked it against what you actually do. Shopify’s own wording on that page: “Although Shopify can generate templates, you’re responsible for following your published policies.” A template promising a refund method you never use is worse than a short, true page.

Your pre-launch policy checklist

Work through these in order before the store goes live:

1. Set Return and cancellation rules in Settings > Policies.
2. Write the return policy to match those rules exactly, including final sale exceptions.
3. Write the shipping policy with processing time and transit time stated separately.
4. Publish contact details with business name, email, phone and physical address.
5. Review the automated privacy settings rather than assuming they fit you.
6. Read every generated template line by line and delete what you do not do.
7. Check the policy links in the footer, cart and checkout on a test order.
8. Save a dated copy of each policy offline. Etsy kept a receipt snapshot for you; now you keep your own record of what was live when.
9. If you sell into markets with their own rules, such as the EU or Japan, follow Shopify’s country guidance and get professional review.

If you keep your Etsy shop running while the store launches, decide whether the two sets of policies match or differ on purpose. Buyers who see both will compare them. The article on opening a store while you still sell on the marketplace covers that overlap, and the daily difference of running your own store covers who answers the emails these policies generate.

What this guide cannot do for you

This is a map of what Shopify publishes and what it asks of merchants, checked against Shopify’s and the FTC’s own pages. It is not legal or tax advice. Consumer law differs by state and country, and some of it depends on what you sell.

Shopify’s own consumer protection page describes itself as a starting point for your own research, not legal advice, and the same applies here. If your policies carry real risk, such as high-value items, subscriptions or significant international sales, a short review by a qualified professional costs less than a dispute.

FAQ

Does Shopify require a return policy?

Shopify’s Help Center says its Terms of Service require current, accurate, public-facing refund policy information on your store. That is a requirement to publish your policy clearly, not a rule about how generous it must be. Local consumer law may set its own minimums, such as the EU right of withdrawal.

Can I just use Shopify’s generated policy templates?

You can start with them, but Shopify says you are responsible for following your published policies. The generated return policy also does not include the return rules you set up, so edit the text until it matches your settings and your real process.

Do I have to accept returns on my Shopify store?

Shopify lets you mark items as final sale, and you can write a no-returns policy. Whether that is allowed for your buyers depends on the law where they live. For EU consumers, Shopify’s own guidance points to a 14-day withdrawal right. Ask a professional before publishing a no-returns policy.

Where do Shopify store policies appear to customers?

At the time of writing, policies are linked in the checkout footer. The return policy is linked on the order review page and the shipping policy on product pages and the cart. You can also add them to your store menus.

Can my Shopify policies be different from my Etsy policies?

Yes. They are separate businesses on separate platforms. If you run both, keep any differences deliberate and state them clearly, because buyers who find both will compare them.