Merchant Policy

Merchant registration

• Merchants must provide accurate business name, contact details, location, service area, categories, and any required business information.
• ShopCity may review, approve, restrict, or suspend merchant accounts based on trust, operational quality, settlement history, and customer experience.
• Only admins can assign advanced roles such as city manager, delivery agent, or admin.

Product listings

• Products must have truthful titles, prices, categories, descriptions, photos, and stock status.
• Cashback is optional and should be used as a marketing feature only when the merchant is willing to fund it.
• Unavailable products should be marked inactive or draft to prevent customers from placing orders.
• Restricted, unsafe, counterfeit, stolen, prescription-only, controlled, or illegal items are not allowed.

Order handling

• Merchants should confirm and prepare orders quickly so ShopCity can support same-day pickup or delivery.
• If a merchant fails to mark an order ready within the required timeframe, ShopCity may cancel the order and deactivate the related product listing.
• City managers may contact merchants by inbox or phone to follow up on delayed orders.
• Repeated delays, cancellations, or poor fulfillment may reduce merchant visibility or cause account restrictions.

Commission, cashback, and settlements

• Merchants may owe ShopCity commission, cashback, service fees, or settlement balances based on fulfilled orders and active business settings.
• Balances should be paid by the due date shown in the merchant dashboard.
• Overdue balances may cause the merchant storefront to become inactive for customers while the merchant can still access the dashboard to pay.
• ShopCity may adjust settlement balances when returns, refunds, chargebacks, cancellations, or disputes are approved.

Payouts for online orders

When customers pay online through ShopCity, admin-managed payouts may be used to pay merchants after the order is fulfilled, return windows or hold periods are satisfied, and any dispute or refund risk is resolved.

Customer communication

• Merchants should communicate politely and respond to customer questions, search requests, order issues, and support follow-up.
• Merchants should not pressure customers to bypass ShopCity for orders that started on the platform.
• Merchant ratings, reviews, response speed, settlement history, and fulfillment quality may affect marketplace visibility.