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Find your deadline

How to find your cancellation and refund deadline

If you recently signed up or paid, you may have a short window to cancel or get money back. The exact deadline depends on what you bought and where. Here is how to find yours.

Last reviewed: 2026-06-18

This is general information, not legal advice. Your own contract and your state’s rules decide what applies to you. When a date matters, confirm it in writing with the company and, if needed, your state consumer-protection office.

Plain answer: Three places set your deadline. Check all three.

  • The company’s own contract: refund, buyback, and return windows.
  • The federal Cooling-Off Rule: a short cancellation window for certain sales.
  • Your state’s consumer-protection rules, which can add their own window.

1. Start with the company contract

The agreement you signed usually sets the most specific deadlines: how many days you have to return a kit or inventory, the product condition required, who pays return shipping, any restocking fee, and exactly how to send the request. Read it and write down the dates. The written policy controls more than anything you were told out loud.

2. Check the federal Cooling-Off Rule

The Federal Trade Commission’s Cooling-Off Rule can give you until midnight of the third business day to cancel certain sales — generally sales of $25 or more made somewhere other than the seller’s normal place of business, such as your home, a hotel meeting, or a rented room. Not every purchase qualifies, and some sales are excluded. Read the FTC pages below to see whether it applies to your situation, and count the business days from the date of your sale.

3. Check your state

Some states add their own cancellation or refund rights. Your state attorney general or consumer-protection office can tell you what applies where you live, and that office is also where you can ask questions if a company will not honor its own written policy.

What to do with the date

Once you know the deadline, you do not have to decide in a panic — you just have to act before it passes. Send any cancellation or return request in writing, keep a copy, and note the date you sent it.

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