eBay.com have announced new returns capabilities are now live on the site enabling sellers the option to manage replacements and exchanges as well as a straight refund option.
You can now offer buyers the option of receiving a replacement or exchange instead of a full refund. This can take place either in your return policy when listing, or at the point that your buyer contacts you through eBay My Messages or when requesting a return, you will have the option to offer a replacement or exchange at that time
eBay say that “Offering replacements and exchanges helps improve the after-sale experience for you and your buyers. It reduces back-and-forth messaging, helps resolve requests more quickly, and encourages customer loyalty”. However it does introduce some complexity, especially if you offer blanket exchanges across all your listings. What happens if a buyers wants to exchange for a size or colour that you no longer have in stock?
Although you can set up a blanket automation rules in your Return Preferences page, it probably makes more sense to have more granular control and to set up the returns options you’re willing to offer at the listing level in your return policy. This is especially the case for EU sellers listing on eBay.com, where you might not want unlimited replacement and exchange items winging their way across the Atlantic.
5 Responses
Any chance of making buyers return the one sent instead or swapping the goods for a different item or maybe stopping them opening a change of mind return and selecting the seller pays eBay returns are a joke in fact eBay is a joke.
eBay the place to get your goods and your money back welcome to eBay assisted theft
welcome news,
shocking that it’s taken them this long to acknowledge and facilitate exchanges.
we sell furniture, exchange or replacement of faulty parts (rather than the full unit) is the norm.
previosuly we’d have people opening return-for-refund cases with the words “can i have an exchange please?”.
after a dozen examples of us arranging an exchange, then ebay refunding the customer regardless, we’ve had to start replying with “no. you opened a return case, now you must return the item”
it’s no good for us, no good for the customer, no good for ebay, yet thats the way they insist on doing things.