Disputes
Disputes are how you ask BOONKA to look into a problem with a payment to a business, and how businesses resolve problems fairly. Whether you’re buying or selling, this guide walks you through everything.
What is a dispute?
A dispute is a formal request for BOONKA to review a payment made to a business. If something is wrong with your order, contact the business first. If that doesn’t solve it, open a dispute from the payment in the app: BOONKA reviews the case with the business and with you.
Disputes are available only for payments to businesses. Sending credit to someone close and recharges are not handled this way: in those cases, contact our support team.
When can I open a dispute?
You open a dispute from a recent payment in the app, in the transaction details. The sooner you do it, the easier it is to handle.
For an older payment, or if you can’t open a dispute, contact our support team.
How do I open a dispute?
- Open the transaction details for the payment
- Choose the issue that best describes the problem
- Explain what happened (up to 1,000 characters)
- Attach up to 5 evidence files, photos, screenshots, chat exchanges (up to 10 MB each)
- Submit; the business is notified immediately
What happens next?
- The business is notified and has 5 days to respond.
- The business can propose a full refund, a partial refund, or a correction, for example re-sending an item or completing a service.
- You have 48 hours to accept the proposal; if you don’t respond, it counts as a rejection.
- If the business does not respond, refuses, or you reject the proposal, the dispute is escalated to the BOONKA team, which takes up to 10 days to decide.
- A dispute is handled within 15 days at most in total.
Possible outcomes
- Full refund, the entire amount is returned to you as BOONKA credit.
- Partial refund, part of the amount is returned to you as BOONKA credit, and the business keeps the rest.
- Correction completed, the business fixes the problem and the dispute is closed.
- Request rejected, the business keeps the payment because the request was not justified.
If you run a business: responding to a dispute
Respond to every dispute within 5 days. You can offer a full refund, a partial refund, or a correction. If you don’t respond in time, the dispute is automatically escalated to the BOONKA team, and your lack of response is recorded as part of the review.
A dispute concerns only the payment in question; the rest of your activity carries on as usual.
The best ways to avoid disputes: describe your products or services clearly, keep to your deadlines, and answer customer questions quickly.
Disputes decided in the client’s favour count as lost disputes, which can affect your business penalty level. Learn more in the Penalties section.
Fair use
Opening a dispute is a serious step. Filing false or repeated claims deliberately harms businesses and is tracked: clients who accumulate rejected claims move up the client penalty ladder and can lose the ability to open new disputes. See the Penalties section for details.
Still need help?
Our support team is here for you.