Damage and missing parts: sending a claim

Last checked 4 November 2026.

Late fees are kept with Keep a late fee for eligible late days, whether the item is still out or back, not when the return is recorded. An extension fee is paid by payment link, never from the saved card. Damage on a saved-card hire is a claim: send your estimate and photos for your customer to approve and pay on Shopify's own payment page.

Damage is a claim. Loss and non-return can be kept from the deposit on newer hires.

Damage is sent to your customer to approve and pay. Loss and non-return can be kept from the deposit on hires agreed under the new terms, which is any order whose checkout agreement carries the sentence "Not returned: the shop can take up to the full deposit". Every order placed before that wording is still a claim, and so is any order where the card does not allow it, where Holdback can't read the card, or where your customer didn't tick the deposit terms, or where the amounts on the order changed after your customer ticked.

• It's not coming back (It's back, then No, there's a problem, once the hire is due back): choose how much to keep, up to what is left of the deposit, and press Keep. The customer is emailed "Not returned: £X kept from your deposit because the item wasn't returned." If it turns up later, refund the difference in Shopify.
• Mark as lost (in the same list, beside It's not coming back, and only once the hire is past its due-back date): offered where the order carries the checkout agreement of version 12 or later (the one with the non-return sentence), your customer ticked the deposit terms, and the deposit can still be kept from the saved card; Holdback reads the card when you press it, and if the card is unreadable at that moment the press becomes a claim instead. On any other order only the claim route is offered. Use it only if your customer has told you it's lost or it can't be returned. The customer is emailed "Reported lost: £X kept from your deposit."
• Keep more from the deposit: after a paid non-return keep, this can keep more up to what is left. It requires the new agreement, a passed due-back date, a not-returned or lost state and no came-back marker. An earlier late-only keep does not qualify. Choose an amount and a fixed reason; private notes are not emailed. Your customer is emailed the amount and reason. It is only offered when Holdback can take it from the saved card. Otherwise the button says Send a payment link, and says why: your customer then approves and pays it on Shopify's own page.
• If the card is declined, it becomes Shopify's payment link for what the order now owes, and anything Shopify hasn't confirmed shows as "Not confirmed yet" until Holdback can prove it.

Shopify Flow: the "Deposit settled" trigger fires when a rental is finished. Keeping more from a deposit you have already kept part of does not fire it again, unless that takes the deposit in full.

Why ask the customer to approve damage

The card networks' rules for hire businesses say a charge for damage or loss has to be a separate payment the cardholder authorises, for no more than the estimate they were given, with their bank able to check it's really them. Taking it from the saved card after the event is the charge a bank reverses when the customer disputes it, and that dispute costs you the money and a fee. A claim the customer has seen, approved and paid themselves is the one that stands.

Guide prices for damage

A damage price list is a list of guide prices for repairs or replacements that customers see at checkout. Set it on Charges, under Damage guide prices. It is copied onto each hire when ordered. Later edits never change an open hire. Guide prices are shown only to customers paying in your store's currency. Customers paying in another currency see none, and none apply to their hires.

Each price can be used once per claim. For a second identical item, add it as something not on the list.

Damage is never taken from a saved card. You send an itemised request with photos, which the customer approves before paying.

A deposit paid at checkout isn't available yet. Every deposit is saved on the customer's card, and damage is claimed as described above.

Sending a claim

On Rentals, open the rental and press Send a damage claim under Take money. (From It's back, press No, there's a problem, then choose what's wrong.) The claim has four steps:

1. What's wrong? — Damaged, A part is missing, or Not returned (or lost).
2. What does it cost? — one line per repair or replacement, with its amount. Up to ten lines. Each shows on their order as "Hire damage claim: your words (estimate)" or "Hire item not returned: your words (estimate)".
3. Photos and a note — the note is what happened, in your words; your customer reads this at the top of the claim email. Your return photos are ticked for you. Add them with Add photos if you haven't.
4. Check and send — read it through, then send it.

Keep any eligible late days separately with Keep a late fee, before finishing the deposit. Sending a claim does not silently keep a late fee. Any extension fee uses a payment link. Resolve an outstanding payment before adding a claim so the customer is not asked to pay an unexplained combined balance.

In step 4, press Send claim for £X. Holdback then:

• releases what's left of the deposit, so the claim is the only thing your customer is asked to pay;
• adds your estimate to their order as its own lines, untaxed, for exactly the estimate;
• emails your customer what happened, each line of the estimate beside the deposit they agreed, that nothing has been charged, what Shopify's payment page will say ("Your order was updated"), and a button to their claim page;
• emails you a copy, with your photos and the evidence pack attached.

Your photos, if you sent any, go on the claim page, not in your customer's email: the email stays small and no inbox blocks it. The claim page shows the before and after photos side by side, the estimate, the deposit they agreed, and what the product page said when they ordered. To approve, they tick I approve this claim of £X and press Approve and pay, which takes them straight to Shopify's payment page. Holdback records when they approved, the amount they saw and the exact words beside the box. That recorded approval is your evidence that they authorised the payment, whatever their bank does about 3D Secure.

The estimate can't be more than what's left of the deposit your customer agreed to at checkout, and if they bought your damage waiver, a damage claim is limited by it (a missing-part claim and a non-return claim aren't).

While a claim is open

The rental shows Claim sent, waiting for your customer, and this, in red:

Don't use Shopify's Collect payment button on this order. It would take the claim from the customer's saved card without their approval.

That button sits beside the balance on the order page in Shopify. While a claim is open, the balance is the claim, and pressing it takes the whole of it from the saved card: exactly what a claim exists to avoid.

Nothing else can be charged or released on the rental until the claim is paid, withdrawn or written off. Your customer's payment page asks for the order's whole balance, so anything added now would be swept into it.

Open the claim shows the lines, whether your customer has approved it, a link to their deposit page (to send again if they ask) and three buttons:

• Check for payment — Holdback also checks on its own, whenever the order changes and every hour.
• Withdraw the claim — it was a mistake, or you settled it another way.
• Write it off — it's owed, but you're not chasing it.

Withdraw and write off both take the lines off the order and tell your customer there's nothing to pay. The record stays on the rental either way.

Reminders. An unpaid claim reminds your customer 3 and 7 days after you send it, and emails you at 14 days with what you can do next. Change the days under Settings → Reminders. While your customer's "I don't agree" message is unanswered, they aren't reminded to pay; lowering the claim starts the reminders again. Holdback won't send a claim more than 90 days after the hire ended.

When your customer pays

Once they've approved it, your customer pays on Shopify's own payment page, which shows the claim as items on their order and may say their order was updated. Their bank may ask them to confirm it's them (3D Secure), though that's the bank's choice and isn't guaranteed. Holdback keeps Shopify's payment record with the claim and emails you both. The rental shows Claim paid.

Shopify's payment page may offer your customer the card they saved at checkout first. Paying with it is their own choice on that page: Holdback doesn't take a claim from the saved card itself.

After a payment through the link, Shopify may remove the saved card from the order. Holdback reads the order again before offering another action. An eligible later payment uses a payment link when the saved card cannot be used. A finished deposit is not reopened for another saved-card keep.

If the repair costs less

Open the claim and enter the Final cost. Holdback refunds the difference to the card your customer paid with and emails them once Shopify says the refund is done. The final cost can only go down: it can never be more than the estimate your customer approved.

If your customer disagrees

On the claim page, I don't agree: message the shop opens a message box. What they write is kept against the claim, shown on Rentals, and emailed to you: reply to that email and it reaches them. They can also simply reply to the claim email. They don't have to pay while you discuss it, and Holdback doesn't remind them to pay until you lower the claim. If you agree a lower figure before they pay, lower the claim from Open the claim; they approve the new figure before paying it. If you were wrong, withdraw it.