E-commerce orders may be harder to return this festive season

livemint.com:

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. Online orders for categories such as fashion, accessories, home decor and kidswear are likely to be harder to return this festive season as companies look at maximising earnings and minimising logistics hurdles, experts said. Direct-to-consumer companies as well as e-commerce platforms Flipkart and Amazon may set a higher bar for accepting returns than in previous festive seasons to maintain margins by eliminating the costs of reverse logistics, staffing and packaging, according to two executives aware of the matter.

Product returns tend to spike by as much as 30% in the last three months of the calendar year, when e-commerce companies typically run sales during major festivals such as Dussehra and Diwali compared to business-as-usual days, according to Shashwat Swaroop, co-founder of GoKwik-owned Return Prime, a returns and exchange optimisation platform. Common ways to curb returns include shortening the return window, charging a return fee to customers who do so frequently, offering only store credit, and disallowing payments at the time of delivery, the executives said. Swaroop added that in some cases, sellers may choose to be lenient with loyal customers while restricting the option for others.

E-commerce companies, especially marketplaces, have tried to curb returns over the past few years. Last year, Myntra introduced a fee ranging from ₹199 to ₹299 for customers with a high rate of returns. However, with the rate of returns rising, they are scrutinising consumer behaviour more closely now than ever.