Guides · Fees, resets and rewards
Refund triggers are scenarios
A fee that comes back if you pass is not a fee you have already saved.
Some programmes describe the initial fee as refundable if you reach the phase target. Atlas does, on both demonstration sizes: the fee may be refunded, resets are excluded, and reaching the target is not guaranteed. That sentence is a scenario. It is not a discount, and it is not cash you should subtract before you have passed.
How the calculator treats it
The cost tool subtracts a refund only when you select that scenario, and it says so. The default is that you do not get it. Selecting the scenario does not raise your probability of passing. It answers a different question: if the trigger happens, which line comes off the bill?
- Scenario you select
- No refund
- Initial
- 429
- One reset
- 0
- Refund
- 0
- Net of these lines
- 429
- Scenario you select
- No refund, one reset
- Initial
- 429
- One reset
- 219
- Refund
- 0
- Net of these lines
- 648
- Scenario you select
- Target met, fee returned
- Initial
- 429
- One reset
- 0
- Refund
- 429
- Net of these lines
- 0 on these lines
- Scenario you select
- Target met after one reset
- Initial
- 429
- One reset
- 219
- Refund
- 429
- Net of these lines
- 219
The last row is the one people skip. They pass on the second attempt, the initial fee comes back, and the reset does not. They are down the reset. The terms said resets are excluded. The celebration tweet will not mention it.
What a refund clause still does not prove
- That you will hit the target.
- That the firm will process the refund on any particular day.
- That a reset, a data fee, or a payment-provider charge is included.
- That ‘may be refunded’ is the same verb as ‘will be refunded’.