Reversals and Refunds: How Reversed Completions Work

What a reversal is

A reversal cancels a completion that was already approved and charged. The cost of that completion goes back to your advertiser balance, and the user who submitted it loses the reward they received for it.

Reversals exist because some problems only show up later. A completion can look fine when it is approved, whether by you, automatically at the end of your approval window, or by the view timer of a click campaign, and still turn out to be fraudulent once more data is available. A reversal corrects that after the fact, so you do not end up paying for a result that was never real.

Rejection vs reversal

The two are easy to mix up, because in both cases you end up not paying. The difference is timing:

Put simply: a rejection means the money never left your balance, and a reversal means it left and came back.

Why a completion gets reversed

The usual reason is fraud that was found after approval, for example:

• The user turns out to be running duplicate accounts or is part of a group sharing the same devices.
• The location was disguised with a VPN or proxy, so the completion came from a country you did not target.
• The proof was faked or reused from another user, which sometimes only becomes clear when many submissions are compared.
• A pattern of automated or bot-like behavior shows up across many completions or visits.

Automated checks filter a lot of this out before a completion ever reaches you, but no check catches everything in real time. Ad fraud and bot traffic explains the common patterns.

How a refund appears in your balance

When a completion is reversed, several things happen at once:

1. The full cost is added back to your advertiser balance, the same amount you were charged for it.
2. A Refund transaction appears under Balance, with a note that starts with “Reversed:” and gives the reason.
3. You get a notification that the completion was refunded, with its number and the amount returned.
4. The completion shows as Refunded in your completions list, with a cost of $0.
5. Your campaign spend goes down by the same amount, so the refund no longer counts toward the campaign’s total budget.

Your campaign statistics also show how many completions were reversed and refunded to you. The user whose completion was reversed cannot take that campaign again.

Reversals and held amounts

Do not confuse a refund with a released hold. While a task completion is pending, rejected but still disputable, or in a dispute, its cost is held from your available balance so the money is there if it is approved. If the completion ends up rejected for good, the hold is simply released. Nothing was charged, so nothing needs to be refunded. Only completions that were actually charged can be refunded through a reversal. How your balance works covers holds, charges, and top-ups.

What if you spot a problem after approving?

You cannot reverse a completion yourself, and a rejection is only possible before approval. That is why careful review matters: once you approve, the decision is yours. If you later find clear evidence that an approved completion was fraudulent, such as an account that never existed on your side, tell us through the contact page with the completion number and what you found. Our team looks into it and decides whether a reversal is justified. It is not automatic, and a completion that met your instructions will not be reversed because it later seems less valuable to you.

Refunds and paused campaigns

A refund adds money to your balance, but it does not restart anything on its own. If a campaign was paused because your balance ran low, you still need to resume it yourself once the balance can cover the next completion. Check your balance after a refund notification if you have campaigns waiting.

How to keep reversals rare

• Review proof carefully before approving, and reject with a specific reason when it fails your requirements. See Review completions and choose the right approval window.
• Ask for checkable proof, such as a username or email you can look up on your side.
• Use frequency caps that fit the task, so the same person cannot repeat an action that should happen once.
• Target realistic countries and devices for your product. A task for an iOS app should not be open on desktop.

If a user disagrees with a rejection before approval, that is a dispute, not a reversal. How to handle completion disputes explains that process.

Frequently asked questions