Free calculator · Updated 1 Nov 2026
COD vs prepaid RTO cost calculator
A COD order that comes back costs you two shipments and a blocked unit of stock, and the customer paid nothing. This calculator turns your RTO rates into an expected cost per order, so a COD fee or a prepaid incentive has a number behind it.
Result
What COD costs you extra, per order
₹29
The most a COD fee or a prepaid incentive should be worth.
- Cost of one failed parcel
- ₹190
- Expected RTO cost per COD order
- ₹38
- Expected RTO cost per prepaid order
- ₹10
- That gap across 1,000 COD orders
- ₹28,500
Calculated in your browser. Nothing you enter is sent to us.
How it is calculated
- Cost of one failed parcel = forward shipping + return shipping + packaging + handling + damage write-off
- Expected RTO cost per order = RTO rate × cost of one failed parcel
- What COD costs you extra = expected cost per COD order − expected cost per prepaid order
Reading the result
- Take both RTO rates from your own shipments for the last 90 days, split by payment mode.
- Re-run it monthly: courier performance and customer mix change.
- A COD fee or prepaid incentive should be worth less than the gap, and the checkout page should say why.
Go further
Guide · 5 min readPricing cash-on-delivery orders with RTO in the modelThe method behind this calculator, with a worked example and the common mistakes.Read the guide →Spreadsheet · ₹2,999COD Order Verification ScriptIt flags risky COD orders against rules you set, before you dispatch them.View Details →