Return postage for damaged Amazon item

Trying_to_get_sorted

Hi, not posted on here for a very long time and think Im posting this on the right board!

Tl;dr - messed around by Amazon, had to pay £64.20 to return bulky heavy damaged item back to them, told they would refund full courier costs but they have now only refunded £4.75 🙁Waiting for them to reply to email but am hoping people here can advise me in the meantime please 😕

I bought a Keter plastic storage shed from amazon (sold by & fufilled by them) in December and when it arrived one part was damaged so they sent out a replacement shed and gave me a number to arrange collection of the damaged one.

A week later I got back in touch with Amazon as couldnt get through to the number they had given me - turns out theyd told me wrong and I had to arrange & pay for return shipping myself and they would refund it once received (annoying but okay).

Problem I then found is very few companies covered a parcel that size (30kg, 150x90x30cm), the ones that dud wanted £100+, it was now nearly xmas and amazons return deadline of 14th Jan was starting to play on my mind (if damaged item not received back by then they were charging me for the replacement @ £120).

Called Amazon again (21/12) and, after much going in circles discussing options, the girl came back and said she had spoken to her superviser, not to worry, that a collection had been arranged for me on 4th Jan due to the size & weight of the item and that I would receive an email with confirmation in the next few days.

Typically no email came and I called on 30th Dec to chase it to be told nothing had been arranged, no record of phone call (it was them calling me back so I have the incoming call history info in my phone), tough luck as they dont collect parcels and that I should just take it to the post office otherwise they would be charging me for the replacement!

In the end I managed to find a Parcelforce bulk service that the parcel was "just" within the limits of. It came to £64.20 (parcel charge, bulky item fee, insurance) and I wasnt convinced amazon would cover it so I called them yet again, explained it all, got told they would cover it (made sure they emailed to say that as well) so I went ahead and booked.

Parcel was delivered to them, I emailed receipts etc yesterday and got a reply to say thank you snd that theyve put in for a refund of £64.20 for me so yay, great, finally sorted...

... Till this morning when I got email to say parcel received & accepted and check account to see refund amount so I did and all they are refunding is £4.75 ???!!! I have emailed them this morning (same email as I sent receipt to and that replied yesterday) to query this and hope to receive a reply today but thought Id ask on here for help & advice on what to do if they arent refunding the full amount 🙁

Am feeling totally fed up, stressed out and miserable about the whole situation and I cant really afford to lose that much on the return shipping especially as it wasnt my fault it needed to be returned 😕

Thanks and sorry for the long post 

MattMattMattUK

Wait for their reply is the best advice, try live chat if you are in a desperate rush. The £4.75 is likely some default payment refund amount, the higher amount will probably need to be processed manually. I have had to return a few damaged items to Amazon over the years, they have normally offer the return courier service through their website so it is a bit unusual that they have not in this instance. Was the item sold by Amazon, or was it a third-party seller on Amazon? Was the order fulfilled by Amazon if it was a third-party seller? 

Trying_to_get_sorted

MattMattMattUK said:

Wait for their reply is the best advice, try live chat if you are in a desperate rush. The £4.75 is likely some default payment refund amount, the higher amount will probably need to be processed manually. I have had to return a few damaged items to Amazon over the years, they have normally offer the return courier service through their website so it is a bit unusual that they have not in this instance. Was the item sold by Amazon, or was it a third-party seller on Amazon? Was the order fulfilled by Amazon if it was a third-party seller? 

Thanks for replying. 
It was sold, fufilled & despatched by Amazon. They did send me a returns label (sender/me to pay postage) and told me to take the parcel to the Post office or local dropshop (for Hermes) - problem is neither option cover parcels that size and it wouldnt fit in my car even if they did! I was also told Amazon had arranged collectionby their own courier but turns out they hadnt and dont offer that for bulky items.

Live chat followed by their callback service are the ones who repeatedly gave me the wrong info or who just copied & pasted returns info and told me to send it back soon or Id get charged for the replacement 😕 If I get time later I may try them, at the moment Im typing this in between other tasks and havent got time to sit down properly.

Just trying to be ready for when they do reply to my email (was sent to the one you send copies of receipts & tracking info to that I used yesterday) so I have an idea what to say to them if they are only refunding £4.75 🙁

MattMattMattUK

Try using the phone option and telling them you wish to raise a formal complaint about the issue. On the few occasions I have had to do that it usually involved some very friendly person from Ireland giving me a call and the issue being resolved very quickly, the people in the Indian call centre have little to no power (usually limited to sending a replacement or a compensation voucher of less than £20), where as the Irish call centre seems to be able to do whatever it takes. 

Trying_to_get_sorted

After several emails and a phone call theyve now refunded the difference as a 'goodwill gesture' rather than admit they messed up and should have done the full amount in the first place.