Apply now

Payments glossary · Singapore

Refund vs void

A void cancels a transaction before it settles, so nothing ever moves. A refund reverses one that has already settled, so money goes out. Which one applies depends on timing, and whether counter staff can do either on the device — rather than raising a support ticket — is a practical thing to test on a demo.

Why it matters to a merchant

One of the few places where a staff-training decision has a direct financial effect. A void before the batch closes and a refund after it are different operations with different consequences for the customer's statement and for the merchant's books — and the window between them is short. Teaching counter staff which one they are doing, and by when, is worth more than any policy document about it.

Where this comes up

Pages on this site that deal with this in context:

Related terms

In this section: How a payment moves

Last updated: 2026-08-03

Written by the Uniweb Pay team, Singapore. Licence details are checked against the MAS Financial Institutions Directory, which is the authoritative source — where anything here disagrees with the register, the register wins.