PARTLY

As of 13 August 2026, AI can only partly draft a returns policy for your UK online shop.

This still needs a person who signs their name to it.

Can you do it?

5 minutesto a draft.

30 minutesto something you’d act on.

Cost, all in£0

Skill neededchat-fluent

Who has to check ita professional

What the alternative costsTermly generates terms and other compliance documents and keeps them updated, but its pricing is not supplied here.

If this goes wrong, customers may be given unlawful cancellation or refund terms and your business may have to resolve complaints or change its policy.

What to actually do

  1. Hand it to a person

    The route this page recommends

    Someone with a licence or accountable authority has to sign this before it counts.

  2. Use a tool built for this

    Second choice

  3. Do it yourself

    The distant third

    A chat interface, chat-fluent skill, and roughly 30 minutes until you can act on the result.

    How to actually do it

    1. Open your shop platform, product catalogue and current checkout pages, then gather the product types, delivery information, contact details and returns practice they currently show.
    2. List any products that are personalised, made to order, perishable, sealed for hygiene reasons or otherwise handled differently from standard goods.
    3. Open the relevant GOV.UK guidance on online selling and consumer returns, and copy the source links into a notes document without treating them as legal approval.
    4. Paste the gathered facts into the prompt, replacing every bracketed slot and leaving a slot marked unknown where you do not have the information.
    5. Paste the completed prompt into a chatbot and save the draft together with its NEEDS CHECKING section and source links.
    6. Compare every shop-specific statement against your catalogue, checkout, delivery process and refund process, then ask a solicitor to check the legal rights, exclusions and cancellation wording before publishing.
    7. Replace the live returns page and checkout wording only after the solicitor's changes are incorporated, and send the final policy through a test order so the customer can find it before purchase.

    Prompt

    Draft a returns and refunds policy for a UK online shop using the information below. Write in plain English for consumers and separate the legal rights that cannot be removed from any optional goodwill policy. Do not invent facts, legal rights, deadlines, exclusions or fees. Do not claim that the policy is compliant. Flag every missing fact, uncertain legal point and product-specific issue in a section called NEEDS CHECKING. Use current UK sources, especially GOV.UK, for any legal point and include source links where possible. Cover ordering and delivery, cancellation, returns, faulty or misdescribed goods, refunds, return postage, exclusions, exchanges, personalised or perishable goods where relevant, proof of purchase, contact details, and how the policy should be displayed at checkout. If the information supplied is insufficient, ask concise questions before drafting. End with a short solicitor-review checklist.

Shop name: [SHOP NAME]
Website: [WEBSITE]
Contact details for returns: [CONTACT DETAILS]
Products sold: [PRODUCT TYPES]
Products that are personalised, made to order, perishable, sealed for hygiene reasons, or otherwise potentially excluded: [DETAILS]
Delivery methods and delivery information shown to customers: [DETAILS]
Current returns, refunds and exchange practice: [DETAILS]
Who pays return postage and in which situations: [DETAILS]
Any goodwill period beyond legal rights: [DETAILS]
Refund method and operational process: [DETAILS]
Business structure and trading address: [DETAILS]
Other relevant shop rules: [DETAILS]

    Open it prefilled in ChatGPT or Claude, or copy it into Gemini, which takes no prefill link.

What it gets wrong

What caps this at PARTLY: legal accountability, regulated advice and verification cost.

How we scored this

Five axes, each scored nought to two by hand: ten means AI carries the task cleanly, and the thresholds that turn a total into YES, PARTLY or NO are published in the methodology. Each axis name links to its definition.

AxisScore (0–2)
Output2
Inputs1
Verification1
Liability1
Effort delta2
Total7 / 10

The methodology and its thresholds are published in full.

FAQ

Can ChatGPT write a returns policy for my UK shop?
It can produce a useful first draft from your product, delivery and refund details. This is not professional advice, so ask a solicitor to check the legal wording before you publish it.
What must a UK online shop include in a returns policy?
It should explain the customer's legal rights, your process for cancellations and returns, refunds, return postage, faulty or misdescribed goods, relevant exclusions and how to contact you. The exact wording depends on your products and how your shop operates, so check the draft against current GOV.UK guidance and obtain solicitor review.
Can AI make my returns policy legally compliant?
No tool can transfer that responsibility from your business or guarantee that a policy is legally compliant. A solicitor should check the policy against your products, sales process and current UK consumer law.
Can I use an AI returns policy without a solicitor?
You can use AI to organise the information and prepare a draft, but publishing it without legal checking leaves you responsible for errors. This is not professional advice, and a serious or unusual case needs a solicitor.

Nearby answers

All Terms & policies rulings

Assessed by gpt-5.6-luna (gpt-5.6-luna) on 2026-08-13, second-checked by an independent model. Wrong somewhere? Email [email protected] and it gets re-checked.

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