The are live on eBay. This means that you can now set automated returns rules either using eBay’s Basic return rules or Advanced return rules which give more flexibility in how you choose which products to apply different rule sets to.
We’ve already discussed circumstances for which every seller should set automatic return acceptance rules – namely cases where the buyer is going to pay the return shipping costs. If the buyer is a fault why not make the return process as slick and quick as possible as at the end of the day you’re going to have to accept it anyway. Quite apart from eBay’s rules it’s the law Distance Sellers have to accept buyer remorse returns.
That leaves you with the circumstances where you’ll be paying the return costs. For some products it simply won’t be worth incurring the return carriage charges and you can set a rule to simply refund and let the buyer keep the product. In other cases you for more valuable products you may wish to set rules for automatic acceptance of the return which include the buyer being obligated to return the item.
Hopefully once you’ve set your rules it will leave you with a limited set of products for which you want to make a case by case decision on how to proceed with return requests – perhaps products which are nigh on impossible to break or products which often throw up questions from buyers but are easy to solve with some technical assistance.
You’ll find the as well as the settings in My eBay.
4 Responses
I wont be setting rules to give an automatic refund. As soon as people work out that you get it FREE if you claim there is an issue and blame the seller it will be on Facebook, you will have a lot of sales followed by a lot of false claims!
I discovered this was live on Monday – after I went to process a refund on something that a returned was opened for last week and went to the resolution and it said that I had no open returns. I knew that I had at least 6 (mostly from Argos where customers had failed to collect…) so then had to spend ages searching emails so that I could find a link to access the return details. It seems that this is the only way to access returns opened before the changes were implemented.
I then went to check on the Automation rules that we had set up for routing returns (faulty items go do a different address) and found that eBay had added a sneaky rule to automatically authorise returns up to the value of £750 which overrode our current settings. Thankfully it didn’t have refund automatically selected though…
I would recommend checking your settings even if you don’t have automation set up just to see what’s there, in case this has happened on your account – you may end up receiving unexpected returns…
I have set up auto refund on items below £5 its easier than messing about paying return postage
I have also added to my listings that items below £5 if the buyer is not happy they can have a refund without return sales are now rocketing on low value items its early yet so don’t know if the return requests will follow I don’t think they will because eBay keep telling us how honest their buyers are.
It is arrogant to talk of “circumstances for which every seller should set automatic return acceptance rules – namely cases where the buyer is going to pay the return shipping costs.”
Not all businesses work the same way, or sell the same products.
Some buyers request returns because they can’t master the product. The buyer’s problem can often be solved by a chat with the seller, or some technical advice. No point accepting an expensive return on an item that may be unsaleable (eg stockings or a television) because the buyer can’t work out how to use the suspenders, or change the batteries in their remote control.
We aren’t all just envelope-stuffers. Some sellers know their products, and sell quite technical stuff.