Insurance companies aren’t known for handing out refunds – but when they do, it can be a bad sign.

Many restaurants and other members of the hospitality and retail industry will be seeing refunds on their premiums this year, or possibly just a bigger return than usual, said Anowsh Dadgar, president of Woburn-based Dadgar Insurance Agency, because of the down economy.

“It’s not a good thing, it’s a bad thing – for restaurants and us,” he said, referring to his agency.

Many restaurants’ general liability policies are adjusted for their sales; the more food and alcohol they dole out, the higher the premium. Restaurants have to estimate their sales at the beginning of a 12-month policy period, and if they do better-than-expected business during that following year, they have to turn over extra money to the insurance company. With poorer-than-expected sales, the opposite happens.

And these days, sales are generally poorer, said Richard Pile, part-owner of Boston-area restaurant chain Elephant Walk.

“It’s not a stunningly wonderful economy,” Pile said.

Pile said his restaurant purposefully overestimates its anticipated sales every year. He figures it’s better to get a small refund than to have to pay out more money at the end of the policy period. Whether Elephant Walk will get a bigger-than-usual refund this time around is uncertain, he said.

Restaurants only get their refunds or extra bills after their insurance providers audit them at the end of a policy cycle. Dadgar said restaurants audited this summer have already gotten refunds, and more are likely to get money back as more policies expire.

It’s not a huge part of most restaurants’ expenses, he said, but for a restaurant with, say, $2 million in sales and a 20 percent decline in business, the refund can get up to $3,000-$4,000.

Tina Gerard of West Hartford-based insurance agency Bovier, Beckwith & Lennox, which is affiliated with the Connecticut Restaurant Association, said many of her restaurant clients’ sales are down by 10 percent this year. For the restaurants with this type of adjustable policy, that will mean a refund.

But Gerard said she sees more insurance companies getting away from the sliding-scale system, and assigning flat premium rates to their restaurants. The flat rate is generally a better bottom-line deal for restaurants and a worse one for insurance companies, she said, but the soft insurance market has driven insurance companies to offer this kind of pricing in an attempt to grab more business.

When the soft market hardens up, Gerard predicted that movement toward flat pricing would end: “As soon as the market starts to turn, you’ll see it go back.”

Gerard said the audit-based policies are problematic because while restaurants will get their money back, they have to wait until the end of both the policy period and the auditing process.

But Pile of Elephant Walk said he preferred the flexible option:

“It’s nice that the insurance works that way, and you have the luxury of getting a refund when your guesses are not right.”