Some stores on Mason Lab carry a Deposit badge with an amount. That amount is the store's own money, set aside from its own balance and shown to you as it stands right now. It exists for one purpose: if a dispute is decided in your favour and the funds held for your order are not enough to refund you, the rest comes out of it.
What it is
Voluntary. No store has to keep one. A store without the badge is not a store under suspicion — it simply has not put money behind its listings.
The store's own money. It is moved out of the store's withdrawable balance and cannot be withdrawn while it sits in the deposit. Mason Lab adds nothing to it and earns nothing from it — no fee, no interest.
Shown as it stands. The badge prints the current balance, not what was once paid in. After a draw the number falls; below a floor the badge disappears until the store tops it up.
What it does for you
Your first protection is escrow: your payment is held by Mason Lab until you confirm, and a dispute inside the window is settled out of the money held for that order — how escrow works. The deposit is the second line, for the case where that money is not enough.
Only a decision on a dispute can draw on it. When Mason Lab staff decide a dispute in your favour — a full refund or a split — and the funds held for your order fall short, the shortfall is paid from the deposit in the same decision. Nothing automatic and nothing else touches it.
Only the shortfall. The held funds are used first. The deposit covers what they could not; it never pays twice.
It has a limit. If even the deposit cannot cover the refund, the decision is not recorded as done and a person handles the case. Mason Lab does not pay refunds out of its own pocket, and this page will not pretend otherwise.
What it is not
Not a licence to sell. Stores trade with or without one.
Not a rating and not a rank. It does not change a store's level, its rating, or where its listings appear. A deposit cannot buy visibility.
Not a guarantee about any one item. It says how much of the store's own money stands behind its refunds; it says nothing about the thing in front of you. Read the listing, the rating and the case history too.
How a store funds it and gets it back
Funding. From the seller console, out of the withdrawable balance. There is a floor the deposit must reach to show the badge and a ceiling on what one store may park; both are printed in the console next to the form.
Getting it back takes time on purpose. A store asks for its deposit back and the money returns after a fixed waiting period, printed in the console. All that time it stays available for refunds.
Not while a case is open. The request is refused, and a matured request waits, while the store has an open dispute, an order whose money is still in escrow or on hold, or a warranty period still running. This is what makes “fund, sell, withdraw before the claim” impossible.
After a draw. The store is told what was taken and for which order. Below the floor the badge goes off until the deposit is topped up.