Legal

Refunds & disputes

Titled "refund policy" is a fiat-commerce term; Dritch is a non-custodial escrow system, so this describes what actually reverses a trade instead.

Dritch never holds your funds to "refund" in the traditional sense. Every marketplace trade lives in an on-chain escrow contract that only ever pays out to the buyer, the seller, or back to whoever put it in, never to Dritch. What follows is exactly what the contract lets you do, and nothing it doesn't.

Marketplace trades

A trade can unwind, in full, in these cases:

Before payment is marked. Either the maker or the taker can cancel at any time while a trade is still Escrowed. Both legs return to their original owners: the asset back to whoever escrowed it, the USDC back to whoever escrowed that.
The payment window lapses. If the payer hasn't marked payment sent within the 2-hour window, either side can call expireTrade and both legs return, same as a cancellation.
After payment is marked. Once the payer has marked a trade paid, only the party who was owed that payment can still cancel it; the payer's own recourse from that point on is dispute, not a self-service cancel, since money may have already moved off-chain.

Disputes

Either party can raise a dispute on a trade that's been escrowed or marked paid. A disputed trade freezes until a single arbiter address reviews it. The arbiter's power is deliberately narrow: a dispute resolves exactly one of two ways:

Settle as agreed. Both legs pay out as if the trade had completed normally.
Return both legs. The asset and the USDC both go back to whoever escrowed them, the same outcome as a cancellation.

The arbiter cannot redirect escrowed funds anywhere else, including to itself or to Dritch. Raising a dispute does not guarantee either outcome; bring evidence (see the in-app trade chat and receipt upload) to support your side before the arbiter reviews it.

What this doesn't cover

Off-chain fiat payments (bank transfers, mobile money, etc.) happen entirely outside the contract and outside Dritch's visibility. If a counterparty takes your fiat payment and then disputes or stalls, the dispute path above is the only recourse Dritch's own system offers. Dritch has no ability to claw back a bank transfer, and no relationship with your bank or payment provider.

Swap

Swap briefly routes your deposit through a Dritch-operated relay wallet (see Terms). If a swap fails to execute after your deposit is confirmed, the relay is expected to return your original deposit rather than leave it stranded; this is an operational commitment, not a contract-enforced guarantee the way marketplace escrow is. If a swap doesn't resolve, contact support with the intent id shown on the Swap page.

Bridge

Bridge transfers are signed directly by your wallet, via either Circle's CCTP or Relay Protocol's solver network, your choice; Dritch's servers never hold the asset in transit on either route, so there is nothing for Dritch to refund. A failed transfer is a matter between your wallet, the source chain, and that route's own forwarder or solver - Relay's own fallback path returns a failed transfer to your wallet on the source chain rather than stranding it, the same operational expectation as Circle's CCTP.

Network and gas fees

Gas paid to confirm a transaction, including one that later gets cancelled, expires, or loses a dispute, is not refundable by Dritch. That cost is paid to the network, not to Dritch, and Dritch has no mechanism to reverse it.

Contact

See the Contact page; reference the trade id or Swap intent id involved.

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