PayPal Refund Status in Chat for WooCommerce Orders

Yes. AeroChat answers PayPal refund status for WooCommerce orders, in the chat. It reads the refunds on the WooCommerce order, checks whether each one was sent to PayPal, and reads its status in PayPal: completed, pending, failed or canceled, on WhatsApp and every other channel.

This recipe answers “where is my refund?” for orders paid with the PayPal Payments plugin, after your team has refunded them. Part of connecting WooCommerce PayPal Payments to WhatsApp and AI chat.

What happens today

A shopper returned an item and was told the money is on its way. They check PayPal, see nothing yet, and message to ask. Someone opens the WooCommerce order, finds the refund, then checks PayPal to see whether it really went through. Sometimes it turns out the refund was only recorded in WooCommerce and never sent to PayPal.

The flow that works

The shopper asks about a refund.
AeroChat asks for the order number and email, and checks both match the order in WooCommerce.
It reads the refunds on the order: amount, reason, date, and whether each one was refunded through the payment gateway.
For a refund sent to PayPal, it reads the refund status in PayPal.
Completed: it gives the amount and date. Pending: it says PayPal is still processing it.
Failed, canceled, recorded only in WooCommerce, or no refund at all: it hands the conversation to your team with the details.

What it looks like on WhatsApp

Customer: You refunded order 4977 on Monday but I can’t see it in PayPal. (example)

AeroChat: Can you confirm the email on the order?

Customer: sofia.r@example.com

AeroChat: Thanks, Sofia. A refund of US$48 for order 4977 was sent to PayPal on November 10 and PayPal shows it as completed. It goes back to the PayPal account or card you paid with. If you paid by card, your bank may take a few days to show it.

In WooCommerce and PayPal: nothing changes. AeroChat read the refund on order 4977, then its status in PayPal: completed.

The recipe

Copy this into AeroChat

When a customer asks about a refund, follow these steps.

Ask for their order number and the email they ordered with. Find the order in WooCommerce and check the email matches. Never share the order if it does not.

Read the refunds on the order.

For each refund that was refunded through the payment gateway, read its status in PayPal.

If it is completed, tell them the amount, the date, and that it goes back to the PayPal account or card they paid with.

If it is pending, tell them PayPal is still processing it and that we will not refund twice.

If it failed or was canceled, tell them our team will sort it out and hand the conversation over with the order number and amount.

If the refund was only recorded in WooCommerce and not sent to PayPal, or there is no refund, do not promise anything. Ask what they were told and hand the conversation to our team.

Never create a refund in this workflow. Reply in the customer’s language.

Change step 6 to match who handles refund problems in your team before you paste it.

What to connect

WooCommerce orders. In WooCommerce, go to Settings, Advanced, REST API, and add a key with read access. Order refunds are documented at woocommerce.github.io/woocommerce-rest-api-docs.
PayPal. In the PayPal Developer Dashboard, create a REST app with the business account your store uses and copy its client ID and secret. Paste them in when AeroChat asks.
Your policies. Upload your returns and refund policy to the AeroChat knowledge base so the replies match it.

PayPal Payments sends refunds made with the Refund via PayPal button to PayPal, and syncs refunds made on paypal.com back to the WooCommerce order. Either way, AeroChat finds them on the order.

After you paste the recipe, AeroChat builds the workflow as a draft and shows a checklist: connect WooCommerce and PayPal, add your knowledge base, then switch it on. If it built the connection from the public documentation, the checklist asks you to check it once against the current docs.

Using a different system? If it has a public API, it connects to AeroChat the same way: describe what you want, paste in its key, and it runs.

Can’t find your tool? Message us in the chat on this page and we’ll tell you how it connects.

What you still decide

Who handles failed refunds and refunds that were never sent to PayPal.
What you tell customers about card refund timing.
Whether new refund requests go to your team or to your returns workflow first.

The result to expect

Refund questions get an answer from the order and from PayPal in one reply. Refunds that were recorded but never sent show up straight away, before the customer asks a second time.

Measure it with your own numbers: refund questions answered by hand per week, and refunds found that never reached PayPal.

Works on every chat channel

This workflow runs the same way on WhatsApp, Instagram, Facebook Messenger, Telegram, the chat on your store and email, with the same connection behind it. See what each channel does on the PayPal Payments integration page.

Channel versions: WhatsApp returns and refunds.

Answer refund questions from WooCommerce and PayPal

Add your keys, refund a Sandbox test order with Refund via PayPal, and ask your own number where the refund is.

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