161–170 of 351 posts
> Fulfillment by Amazon Donations, which Amazon says will help sellers send returns directly to charities instead of disposing of them. So the seller ends up having to take the loss?
It's insane to me that ONE of their returns traveled 105 miles around the city of Toronto alone.
The assumptions underlying the criticism of Amazon's and FedEx's strategy is that landfill costs and/or transportation costs do not represent the true cost to society.
> 30 to 40 per cent of all online purchases are sent back That seems almost an order of magnitude higher than I’d expect. Setting aside kids shoes (which probably do get 50% returned), I can’t imagine sending back even 5% of my online purchases, let alone 30-40%. I think I’ve sent back exactly 1 Amazon order in the last year, out of nearly 100.
I have friends who send back nearly everything. Not sure about shoe size? Order 3 sizes, keep the one you like and send back the other two (or return all 3 if you dont like it). Want a shirt? Order 5 and keep the ones you like, if any.
I always felt bad about returns, but my SO worked retail in school and assured me this is how it's designed to be and how every big shopper does it.
And I don't blame returners. There used to be a website that listed variance in sizes from major clothing brands and fashion lines, and it can be huge. If I like a cut of jeans or slacks, I have to try on several, and they without fail will not fit the same.
If they try to repair an irreparable hard drive but throw perfectly good items like a bag they're quite dysfunctional.
And their inability to send all the ordered items in ONE package is irritating too.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think it depends a lot on category. What you said about kids clothing is spot on, but I'd expect similar dynamics for women's clothing (tighter fits = lower tolerance, also lower tolerance for color mismatch etc) and there are a couple of categories that I've outright stopped buying on Amazon because of the enormous problem rate, namely whitelabeled consumer electronics. In 2020 I've returned ~5%: markers that were…
I've also stopped buying at Amazon after 15 years. Even consumables and small items are problematic. Just in the last year, I encountered many issues including: * Showerhead that came without box, and clearly used. It still had a lot of water inside! * Underwear from a brand that sells items inside a sealed bag and discards returns came used, without bag (yuck!) * A module of Samsung RAM had visible wear signs and di…
I ordered a camera lens which also came in a padded envelope. $400.
I got a box of wet wipes from them. It had its own sturdy box and they were placed in another box lined with shipping paper. $12.
I also won't buy anything that goes into my body. I ordered toothpaste and it came from some guy's basement. He wrapped them in plastic wrap and wrote two pack on the outside.
Amazon gets lazier and lazier by the day and is in a lot of ways no better than a flea market.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm sure there are people who abuse the system, but for you example of clothes, I'm not surprised there is a high number of returns. Last year I bought two Levis jeans at the same time. One the exact same model, color and size as the one I was wearing which was worn out, the other a different color (figured I could use having two pairs of jeans). None fit me correctly. The model I had already was too big, the other t…
Levis in particular are just notoriously inconsistent in sizing. At a brick and mortar store you grab five pairs to try on if you want to buy one or two.
> 30 to 40 per cent of all online purchases are sent back That seems almost an order of magnitude higher than I’d expect. Setting aside kids shoes (which probably do get 50% returned), I can’t imagine sending back even 5% of my online purchases, let alone 30-40%. I think I’ve sent back exactly 1 Amazon order in the last year, out of nearly 100.
People who pay for Prime do it specifically because it facilitates the way they shop. They buy a lot of stuff, figure out what they want, like, and need, and send the rest back.
It's completely normal, expected behavior in retail apparently.
In Germany there are companies that buy up returns by the kilogram (mostly clothes), sometimes the e-commerce companies even pay them to take the goods off their backs. They then ship them to countries like Irak, Serbia or Lebanon to prevent those perfectly goood items to "flood" the European market. That way especially clothing brands protect their inflated prices.
So, then, why aren’t there companies doing the reverse: buying up the bulk clothing return boxes, not shipping them out of the country, but instead retailing them locally (and, indeed, “flooding” the domestic market in the process)? Seems like exactly the sort of competitive strategy I’d expect from the “off-price” stores (TJ Maxx in the US, Winner’s in Canada, etc.).
> 30 to 40 per cent of all online purchases are sent back That seems almost an order of magnitude higher than I’d expect. Setting aside kids shoes (which probably do get 50% returned), I can’t imagine sending back even 5% of my online purchases, let alone 30-40%. I think I’ve sent back exactly 1 Amazon order in the last year, out of nearly 100.
I do think that anything they cannot process properly should be handed off to charity groups who would get items in exchange for helping sort it all out. Then again, having seen my local St Vincents and Goodwill they to suffer overflow but at least with Amazon returns the items would be newer