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Yesterday, #Is the refund-only policy of e-commerce really reasonable# became a hot search. According to media reports, a women's clothing e-commerce seller had a store turnover of about 10 million yuan during the 618 period, but the refund amount alone reached 3.5 million yuan, the number of returns and refunds reached 3.8 million, and the remaining 2.7 million was unknown. The overall return rate is currently close to 80%, and the estimated loss is nearly 600,000 yuan.
For a while, the discussion on "Is the refund-only policy of e-commerce really reasonable?" attracted the attention of many sellers. In fact, in recent years, not only domestic e-commerce, but also many cross-border e-commerce platforms have successively promoted "refund only service". The original intention was to reduce the internal friction of platform turnover and improve consumers' after-sales experience to increase repurchase rate. However, from the actual operation situation, this service seems to be often regarded as a "free tool" by those with bad intentions. It is learned that recently, a seller revealed that a large number of Temu tutorials on refunding but not returning goods have appeared overseas. On a certain overseas social platform, several overseas bloggers posted tutorials on how to only refund but not return products at Temu in the form of video recordings. Many of the videos have been played over 10,000 times , attracting a lot of buyers to watch. Some buyers even posted their "achievements" in the comment section by imitating these methods and only successfully getting refunds. If you type "Temu Refund Without Return" on Google , you can also search for a large number of tutorials about Temu refund without return. One article even describes the specific operation process in detail. The article states that Temu is known for its low prices and will prioritize customer satisfaction , so the following situations may allow buyers to achieve "refund only without return": The buyer expresses dissatisfaction with the order; The goods are damaged, defective or not what the buyer ordered; Missing goods; The order has been used for one free return.
The article also mentioned that Temu has a "return failure" vulnerability that allows users to get a refund without returning the goods: for example, through negative review complaints , buyers can apply for a refund for goods that have been received and used, or for goods that do not meet normal refund standards (for example, the goods are not damaged or defective). It is worth mentioning that although the article shows that there are many risks in exploiting this vulnerability, and Temu has begun to fix this vulnerability, such as "limiting the number of times a refund can be applied for within a certain period of time" , there are still many buyers who successfully exploit the vulnerability to get free stuff. In addition, according to industry media reports, recently in the Reddit community, which claims to be the "American Post Bar", there are also a large number of "freeloader" communities , which share methods of refund-only operations every day. There are countless successful freeloader cases, and the methods include but are not limited to "Temu products below US$10 only apply for refunds, and the freeloader rate is relatively high." According to industry sources, since May, Temu sellers have revealed on major social platforms that their stores are directly refunding products without returning them. Considering the recent emergence of a large number of "zero-yuan shopping" tutorials overseas, it is hard not to infer that the two are closely related. But it is worth mentioning that this is not the first time that a large-scale freeloading campaign has occurred against e-commerce platforms overseas. The "refund only, no return" service has been controversial since its launch. From the platform's perspective, this service can not only reduce the platform's internal friction in turnover, but also reflect the e-commerce platform's emphasis on consumers; but for sellers, this service also makes sellers too passive in transaction after-sales. Not only are their own legitimate rights and interests not protected, but they also have to bear corresponding losses. The reason for this controversy is undoubtedly that with the advancement of the "refund only, no return" service on major e-commerce platforms, overseas freeloaders are also emerging in large numbers. In fact, according to sellers, before Temu, overseas wool party had been rampant on multiple e-commerce platforms: "There were a lot of these freeloaders when we started eBay 10 years ago, so we are not surprised by them anymore." "Don't even mention Temu. Five or six years ago, Russian and Ukrainian buyers on AE were already sharing on VK how to get AE products for free." It is understood that Amazon sellers have also been deeply hurt by large-scale "zero-dollar purchases" before. In August 2021, a large number of tutorials on Amazon refunds without returns also emerged on the Internet, which is very similar to the recent Temu incident. The "freeloaders" also published articles and videos to promote it. For sellers whose performance was not very good, this kind of self-righteous freeloading behavior is tantamount to adding fuel to the fire. In the final analysis, the "refund only, no return" policy is indeed unreasonable. Although the platform has the good intention of improving the shopping experience of buyers, it should not ignore the reasonable rights and interests of the sellers themselves. At present, there are still many "freeloaders" who want to exploit the "refund only, no return" service loophole. Before the platform rules are further improved, sellers still need to have a certain degree of prevention awareness and be prepared to set product purchase limits, track order logistics information in real time, etc. What do you think about this? Welcome to discuss in the comment area~
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