I'm all good! Life keeps going
and you?
If you put a delay on the return track, with the signal 100% wet, and put a phaser there as well, then yes, only the delay will have the phaser effect.
Well the difference is just that. If you put a bunch of effects on the same instrument/audio channel they are all going to affect the dry signal coming from the source. The return tracks do not do this, because the signal is split to the return track, leaving the signal from the instrument/audio track untouched.
So you have a whole separate track with just effects, so you can put effects on just the effects, and then mix it back on top of the dry signal.