How does this affect your customers?
Most Amazon customers are satisfied with the return options the company offers. However, this has its disadvantages from both an economic and environmental point of view. For this reason, the conditions for returning goods will be changed to “cover operating costs income and reduce waste”.
Sellers with the highest number of returns will become more active.
Changes to the return policy that Amazon will implement starting January 1, 2025. will not have a direct impact on consumers. The goal of the e-commerce platform is for sellers whose products are being returned en masse to pay extra. Buyers shouldn’t notice this new condition at first, but some sellers might raise their prices to avoid losing out.
The extra money sellers must pay will only affect items that exceed a certain number of returned items, depending on the category. To calculate the surcharge, Amazon will take into account percentage of units shipped and quantity that is returned between this month and the next two.
Amazon explains that this is a “new return processing fee for products with a high return rate.” Of course, there will be special categories that will be exempt from tax, e.g. clothing, glasses, shoes and accessories. Clothes are typically returned due to sizing issues or because users are unconvinced of how well they fit personally, and are therefore excluded from new features in Amazon’s return policy.
In addition, the company clarifies that small sellers who send less than 25 units per month They will not be affected. Thus, Amazon will not penalize companies that start their online sales business on its platform. After all, the return rate can be quite high compared to sales when there are few of them and the results will be unbalanced.
Although the new return policy will go into effect on January 1, the seller fee increase will be applied at a later date to properly calculate the additional costs. According to Amazon, charges will begin to arrive. from 7 to 15 April. That is, it will take more than four months to demand higher rates from those sellers whose products generally do not convince consumers.
In this way, Amazon hopes to combat the constant returns on its platform, reducing the associated financial costs and being more environmentally friendly.
Customers will maintain the same return requirements.
Amazon buyers in Spain have the right to withdraw from a sales contract without any reason within 14 calendar days after you received the parcel. In addition, e-commerce allows you to return an item even if it has passed 30 days. It appears that refund times will not change with the platform policy changes that will take effect on January 1, 2025.
Some items cannot be returned. For example, cosmetics They cannot be sent back for a refund once opened, nor can items be sent back for a refund. personalized or with daily press.
Except, returns are not always free. Sometimes customers have to pay shipping costs, which vary depending on the package delivery service used. They range from €2.99 for Correos to €5.50 for international returns.