Retail online website threatens to remove customers

GingerTim

Exodi said:

This style of thread is becoming increasingly common.

I think the public is totally ignorant to the sheer scale and cost of return logistics.

The OP's attitude is a testament of this (who I expect will not be returning to the thread, as every response was not of resounding approval as they had expected).

Hudson8949 said:

I ordered more than one footwear item to try them on. With the intention of keeping one pair.  Shoes are tricky, especially trainers and special events.

Hudson8949 said:
Don;t you do that?

There's another thread running where a poster had ordered £300+ of clothing while deciding what to wear for an event, kept only one item worth <£30 and returned the rest, and had their account closed (though the point of that thread is that the refund has gone awry there and they are due money).

I realise a massive global retailer is hardly going to be put into penury by this, but people surely can't be surprised if a retailer no longer wants their business if this sort of ordering becomes a pattern?

BoGoF

It's people like the OP that mean more and more are (rightly) abolishing free returns..

born_again

Exodi said:

This style of thread is becoming increasingly common.

I think the public is totally ignorant to the sheer scale and cost of return logistics.

If only people ordered what they thought was their size (yes I know there is little consistency) but using the same retailer gives you a good idea.

Rather than ordering 4 of the same in different sizes & then returning 3 of them. 

screech_78

This is actually becoming quite common now. I’ve seen some “influencers” complaining that the likes of ASOS have banned them from shopping. As they’re purchasing a load of clothing for the sole purpose of creating content and then sending everything back. 

You would be amazed at the amount of people who think they are “loyal” customers of a shop, but when you look at their account, they actually keep very little and so they actually cost the business more money than they spend. 

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head

Exodi said:

I think the public is totally ignorant to the sheer scale and cost of return logistics.

I agree but don't see what that has do with consumer rights  

It's presumably more profitable to trade online with the cost of returns than close the website and go back to just having B&M stores otherwise that's what they'd do. 

Also these costs are overheads, the companies don't like it because increased prices reduced sales, which reduces economies of scale, which pushes prices up ultimately allowing competition that doesn't require economies of scale to emerge. 

The supermarkets for example could all double the price of meat and veg tomorrow but if they did the high street would end seeing butchers and green grocers return.

The plight of the massive company doing everything as cheap as possible so they can dominate the market isn't one to award sympathy to IMO. 

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head

HillStreetBlues said:

A letter on it's own isn't a contract as there needs to be an acceptance. The person can reply to the letter stating " I will continue to return as many items as I see fit while it is cover by CPR".
You can be given a time limit to raise any objections, after that it can be deemed as accepted.

Currently some supermarkets use two different type of unit measurements for the same product and some don't show the per 100g etc price for promotional pricing. 

This doesn't affect the contract, it is however an action that may affect the consumer's transactional decision, as cited by the CMA.

The CPRs aren't looking at contracts, they are looking at actions, what trader's say, do and how they act and how that may affect the consumer.

Nothing to do with the consumer but for an offence to occur there doesn't even need to be a mislead consumer or a contract, simply a misleading action or omission or an aggressive practice. 

HillStreetBlues said:

" I will continue to return as many items as I see fit while it is cover by CPR".

That would be covered by CCRs  

HillStreetBlues

@the_lunatic_is_in_my_head
If your view that the letter is a breach of the CPRs what legal remedy could be taken?

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head

HillStreetBlues said:

@the_lunatic_is_in_my_head
If your view that the letter is a breach of the CPRs what legal remedy could be taken?

Right to redress is detailed in the legislation

Effectively OP could claim any order they placed from now on they would have exercised their contractual right to cancel but didn't due to the actions of the trader.

Company is unlikely to agree, would likely take the opinion of a court who would decide whether the actions breached the legislation. Not worth doing but equally doesn't mean such behaviour should be considered acceptable.

Just to clarify again, if the company had wrote to OP and said "no more business for the two of us" that's fair enough as I see it.

One last thought on this topic aside from consumer rights, it's easy to blame people for their behaviour but there is a bit of reap what sow here, it was these companies that come along with these ideas of free and easy returns and hey isn't life convenient when we don't have to pay high rents & business rates and loads of staff you don't have to go to the shops it'll just turn up at your door in order to encourage people to buy from their online stores, not to mention a general idea of entitlement is good fuel for getting people to buy endless steams of rubbish they don't need, and shock horror, some people fall for it and use this convenience to it's fullest extent. 

sheramber

Asos and Next are among the retailers sending out letters to problem returners – a customer who sends back more than nine in 10 of the items they order over an extended period, according to one industry definition – warning them their accounts are being monitored.

Asos customers found to have continued to abuse the system may then have their account deactivated – although this is understood to be a tiny proportion – considerably less than 0.5% of those shopping on the site.

Next says it only writes to those who have been returning an extremely high proportion of the items they order for over a year and protections are in place for vulnerable shoppers who may particularly struggle with finding the right size.

………….

In September, H&M became the latest on a list of retailers, including Boohoo, New Look and Uniqlo, who are now charging for online returns – unless they are brought back to a store in person. Several other big players are thought to be weighing up introducing delivery fees in one way or another this year.

https://amp.theguardian.com/business/2023/nov/10/many-unhappy-returns-uk-retailers-count-the-costly-growth-in-sent-back-items

HillStreetBlues

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head said:

HillStreetBlues said:

@the_lunatic_is_in_my_head
If your view that the letter is a breach of the CPRs what legal remedy could be taken?

Right to redress is detailed in the legislation

Effectively OP could claim any order they placed from now on they would have exercised their contractual right to cancel but didn't due to the actions of the trader.

Company is unlikely to agree, would likely take the opinion of a court who would decide whether the actions breached the legislation. Not worth doing but equally doesn't mean such behaviour should be considered acceptable.

Just to clarify again, if the company had wrote to OP and said "no more business for the two of us" that's fair enough as I see it.

One last thought on this topic aside from consumer rights, it's easy to blame people for their behaviour but there is a bit of reap what sow here, it was these companies that come along with these ideas of free and easy returns and hey isn't life convenient when we don't have to pay high rents & business rates and loads of staff you don't have to go to the shops it'll just turn up at your door in order to encourage people to buy from their online stores, not to mention a general idea of entitlement is good fuel for getting people to buy endless steams of rubbish they don't need, and shock horror, some people fall for it and use this convenience to it's fullest extent. 

The company would point out no rights have been breeched they would have honoured the 14 day return period.. The letter did not state or imply that a contract would be breached. The letter was a statement of fact, as that was our position.

For me to win a case the customer would have to believe that the company might breach the contract, leading them to take an action they wouldn't normally have taken. But there is no intention to breach the contract.