How retailers could curb the worst abuse of their returns policies

Here’s a sign that all is not simpatico between retailers and their customers: When it comes to returns, industry insiders are defining which common practices by consumers are “fraud,” which are “abuse,” and which are “unfavorable.”

Loop, a returns management software company that works with retailers, has released a report that not only categorizes shoppers’ sub-optimal return behaviors, but also—thanks to a survey of 1,000 online US shoppers—reveals their scope.

In all, 39% of respondents said that either they or someone they knew had participated in one of the three types of negative returns behaviors.

As for the gradations, here’s how Loop categorized the behaviors, from least to most onerous:

Unfavorable

• Bracketing, which means ordering multiple items with the intention of keeping just one, often to make sure of getting the right size but also for other reasons, like seeing what colors look best in person.
• Attempting to return an item that is either ineligible for return or past the return window.

Abuse

• Wardrobing, the term for purchasing an item to wear for an occasion, and then returning it.
• Purchasing an item with the intention of initiating a return, with the expectation that the retailer will say to keep the item anyway.
• Claiming that an item is defective when it’s not, intending to get a refund or discount.

Fraud

• Lying that a product never arrived, then getting a refund or a replacement item.
• Purchasing with a stolen credit card, then trying to get a refund applied to a different card.

Curb your returnism: When consumers were asked what measures would be the most effective in making them stop abusing returns policies:

• 37% said that charging for returns would make them stop.
• 26% said they’d knock it off if they were informed that the behavior could either get them banned from a store or face legal action.