> Even if we use your example of next business day what happens on a Friday where the refund isn't processed until Monday or Tuesday?
The same thing that happens when you make a purchase on a Friday: It most likely gets posted to your account the following Monday. No clearing (or at least settlement) on the weekend goes both ways.
I'm specifically talking about refunds not purchases as in US only a few states have laws relating to returns and refunds.[1] Otherwise its left up to the retailer to set the policy. Most purchasers are not making large amounts of interest on their checking accounts compared to the balance amounts a business would carry. If no settlement happens on the weekends I can see a large advantage to a business holding one million dollars in refunds for two extra days before you complete or run the batch job of refunds.
When I make a purchase I don't get to decide when to run the batch job for it to post/settle. Retailers however can determine when they want to actually process refunds. What can a customer complain about when the posted refund shows up on the following Monday, Tuesday, Friday, two weeks later?
To further my point of retailers not being incentivized to process your refund quickly there was a small study done that delaying refunds had customers "re-spending" the refund before it had fulled settled.[2]
The same thing that happens when you make a purchase on a Friday: It most likely gets posted to your account the following Monday. No clearing (or at least settlement) on the weekend goes both ways.