Is this some sort of American thing I’m too European to understand?
Yes, it is. That’s because companies like trying unpopular policies in America first before moving them to Europe.
Try telling that to my unequivocal legal right to return anything for any reason within 14 days at no cost to myself other than postage
Yes. You have to pay for postage. Americans pay nothing and Amazon forced them to pay one dollar. I’m sure retailers would happily trade free returns for a 14-day return policy that makes the customer pay for postage.
In Sweden. Never paid postage to return anything to a shop. Never paid postage to send a product anywhere, actually, be it for warranty or what have you. Typically the store either gives you a shipping label to print out, or they send you one.
That’s usually how it is in America too. Amazon started charging $1 if you took it to a courier office instead of a Whole Foods (Amazon-owned grocery store chain) if the Whole Foods was closer to you.
The thought of Amazon selling food too creeps me out so bad.
It’s just a regular grocery store, albeit a rather expensive one. They give discounts for Prime members. In the back, there is an area where workers accept Amazon returns and you can also pick up orders there in the odd chance you would ever do that instead of having it delivered to your home at no extra cost…?
Edit: I remembered that some people might want packages delivered here if they’re frequent victims of package theft
Whole
PaycheckFoods existed before Amazon (I’m fairly sure).Honesty I didn’t realize Amazon had acquired them.
Det inte sänt,eller?? Även med Biltema, Stadium ? Aldrig har provat, jag tar grejer direkt till butik. Om det är sänt jag vill gärna stoppa köra att bära retur.grejerna.
Aldrig köpt från dessa butiker. Om du har köpt i butik så antar jag att retur sker i butik. Annars skulle jag tro att de står för returen. Kolla med kundtjänst.
Yup, thats because the EU actually protects their consumers unlike the great ol’ US of A
It depends. If the company dives in headfirst with anticonsumer practices in the EU, you’re correct; EU institutions will regulate them out. But there’s a much smarter strategy that works more often than I think you’d like to admit:
- Start said anticonsumer practice in the USA
- USA is slower to enact legislation against it
- US customers get used to it
- Inch EU customers into said practices
- When confronted, point to the USA and say that the Americans are fine with it so it must not be that bad.
- 50% of the time EU regulators respond with “oh, alright then”. The news of said practice being introduced into the EU appears on The Register for a day and then everyone forgets about it. Most EU consumers don’t realise it happened.
To do this in the EU would mean breaking the law, which mandates 14 days of free returns with no requirement to justify the reason whatsoever, so I’m pretty sure this wouldn’t work ;-).
You guys don’t drunk-order a bunch of useless shit then expect to return it for no cost once buyer’s remorse sinks in?
Point is, we have laws enforcing that possibility. It’s not goodwill from companies…
Why yes, yes we do
You guys get free health care and you can return stuff? Also, don’t you have a guaranteed warranty of 3 or 4 years?
Five years, actually, here in Norway. Technically two years, and five if the product is meant to last appreciably longer than two years. But that is true for most things except wearable electronics like earbuds.
I know you guys don’t live in utopia, but fuck, you have it better than us in a lot of ways.
Most 3rd world counties have it better than the US
I think they call it developing countries now. I don’t think Mexico is considered developing but has free healthcare, who else are you talking about?
First world = NATO
Second world = Warsaw Pact
Third world = non-aligned
Developed world = rich countries
Developing world = poor countries
Global south = also poor countries, but with more emphasis on Africa and South America
Thanks for that comment, US is down to #21 on that list. I don’t see Mexico on the developed world list, so I guess they are developing but still have free health care.
In Australia our consumer protection laws have minimum warranty for most items (eg 3yrs or something for basic electronic products) but it scales with cost and quality.
It does not apply to everything as far as i know, but say you buy a $8,000 TV, you would likely get 5-6 years warranty because a TV of that cost should imply, to a reasonable consumer, it is of a quality that would be expected to last 5-6 years.Two, but I don’t think it applies to medical procedures
2 years by law everywhere in the EU.
War-ranty? What is this? A guarantee of war? Sounds like apple pie to me. 🇺🇸
So companies will stop lying in the sizing charts, right? Right?
If the sizing chart says size M fits a 28” waist and the size M is actually 32” in the waist, their lying ass should pay the return shipping.
Mankind will die out before vanity sizes do.
To be clear, what’s under discussion is free shipping on returns. And fine, whatever. It will be annoying, but if the price of returning in the same packaging is known at purchase time, I’ll survive and adjust my shopping with that vendor as necessary.
If free shipping on returns disappears, I won’t shop online anymore
I will continue to only deal with companies that offer free returns.
Returns are really bad you guys. Independent research from this federation shows it’s like… 800 billions. That’s a scary number, right?
Scooby Doo mask reveal.
Guess I just won’t buy online then. Not worth the risk
We don’t have this issue in Cyprus. Here there is no such thing as a return. Once you’ve given them your money they aren’t giving it back. Even if the item is faulty, they’ll just send it for repair or blame you.
But you are definitely not getting your money back.
Dang. You can’t review bomb them or something?
No. It’s literally ALL shops. Cypriots don’t like to give back money
Sounds like y’all just don’t have consumer protection laws at all.
The end of everything for one dollar shops at the border haha
Not in the EU it’s not. It’s law here.
No, it’s not. You have the right to return it (Dutch: herroepingsrecht) but the cost of returning can be at the expense of the buyer when stated on their webshop. Check their ToS
Okay yes if we are talking about shipping then that’s true.
The article and the referred articles are about the return shipping fee, not about handling and so. For example, fashion retailer H&M are beginning to charge European countries too, perfectly fine with the law :)
63% of consumers said they order multiple sizes or versions of the same item, with the intention of returning what they don’t want, according to Narvar.
Holy fucking shit. The degree of waste is astonishing. I can’t believe this number is so high. Fuck everyone who does this.
Most returns go right to the dump. We try to refurbish ours but even that is a huge cost that isn’t always advantageous to businesses. Adding a cost to it will reduce waste and unnecessary purchases which is good for everyone and the environment.
Free returns is great insulation against broken products.
In my experience having to pay 15% of the purchase price just to return something that arrived broken definitely prevented any unnecessary purchases from that company in the future.
I didn’t see it on the article, but I would expect that returns/replacements for broken, defective, or misleading items will still be free. I’m guessing the problem is people using free returns when buyers remorse kicks in.
If that’s the case, I imagine they’ll suddenly see an uptick of destroyed merchandise coming back. Seems counterproductive because then there’s no way to resell it.
That’s why the warranty exists. If something arrives broken then the company hasn’t actually fulfilled their obligation of sending you the product you ordered in the first place, but that doesn’t mean a refund, but a replacement product. It also circumvents any “we’ll give a refund but not for the shipping cost” or “we send the replacement but you have to cover the shipping” bullshit - they didn’t send what you ordered, it’s their responsibility to fix it until you have it working on your hands.
I don’t know a single company that will charge you for a return if you receive something broken. It just doesn’t happen. 95% of our returns are buyer’s remorse or they didn’t research their needs better. Easier just to buy and return then to do the work.
I’ve had it happen.
Even on Amazon I’ve had vendors not want to refund money for broken items without me shipping back at my cost.
I’ve never paid for it, if push comes to shove I’d dispute it with Amazon and my credit card company.
I paid for a delivered functional product.
Those companies don’t last there, believe me. I’ve been on Amz since they opened to 3rd party sellers and we are a top 500 seller. Literally for any reason we send out replacements or parts because that’s how your company succeeds. What I was talking about is the people who abuse the process and there are a lot of them. One warehouse can throw away over 100,000 items a week and there are 100s of warehouses in the US. It’s a collosal amount of waste mainly because returns are risk free to the customer.
Glide Gear. Glide Gear will charge you to return faulty merchandise. There. Now you know one.
I bought a frame online from Michaels that arrived broken. I drove to the store, rather than pay to ship it back, and they said they would refund me the price of the frame, but not the shipping I paid for originally. It took a manager (15 minute wait) and many minutes of me insisting I shouldn’t have to pay anything for a broken product for them to finally just give up and swipe the card that allowed them to refund my shipping (only as store credit, mind you). They were not happy about it.
Then =/= than
They used to, but not anymore. Amazon Warehouse exists as a seller for a reason.
