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A trade that doesn’t settle by its deadline still ends, and each side gets its funds back. No fee is taken on any of these paths.

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Before any money moves

Creating an order reserves part of the Maker’s ad. If the Bridger never funds it, the reservation is released after ~30 minutes. Nothing happened on-chain, so there’s nothing to refund.

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A locked trade that didn’t settle

1

Start the cancel

After the deadline, anyone can start a cancel on the ad chain (claimCancel). The trade shows Cancellation claimed and the cancel window opens.
2

The cancel window

During the window, a co-signed payout or a proof that the trade settled still ends it as settled. Either party can also file a dispute.
3

Finish the cancel

After the window, anyone can finish it (finalizeCancel). The Maker’s lock returns to the ad, and a cancel leaf is recorded in the ad chain’s Merkle Mountain Range.
4

Refund the deposit

On the order chain, the refund (refundByCancel) proves that cancel leaf and returns the Bridger’s full deposit. The trade shows Refund on its way, then Cancelled.
The order chain checks the cancel against a root published by the anchor service. If the anchor service is unavailable, refunds on the order chain wait until it returns: the order chain has no clock of its own and only follows the ad chain’s proven outcome.

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An order the Maker never locked

If the Bridger funded the order but the Maker never locked, there’s no lock to release. After the deadline, anyone can cancel the order on the ad chain (cancelNeverLocked) by proving the Bridger’s deposit. That records a cancel leaf, and the Bridger is refunded on the order chain the same way as above. The same route refunds an order whose fee changed between the deposit and the lock.

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Who sends these transactions

All of these calls are permissionless. The relayer normally sends them, so you don’t have to do anything. If you’d rather not wait, the trade page has a button for each step that applies (Claim cancel, Finalize cancel, Cancel never-locked order, Refund the deposit), and the relayer serves the data and proofs each one needs.

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A payout that couldn’t be delivered

If a payout can’t be pushed to a recipient (for example, a token transfer fails), the amount isn’t lost and the trade still ends. It’s credited to the recipient as a claimable balance, which they withdraw with claim. Claiming is never blocked by a pause.

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One side settled, the other didn’t

If one side’s payout landed but the other’s didn’t, the missing side can be completed by proving the settled one (presentSettled). The trade page offers Record the settled leg and Settle the other leg for this.