"Most of the skirts were worn, and when the package was opened, a foul smell came to the nostrils, and they could not be resold at all, so they had to be scrapped." Recently, in the face of more than 400 returned skirts, Mr. Yao, the owner of an online store in Jinhua, Zhejiang, was heartbroken.
After Mr. Yao checked the return orders, he found that these orders were collective returns, and he directly lost nearly 8,000 yuan, which also led to a surge in the return rate of the online store. "The higher the return rate, the lower the store's ranking, and the lower the weight."
Such incidents do not occur by chance. Some time ago, the topic of "an e-commerce women's clothing merchant complained that the return rate was as high as 80%" rushed to the hot search. Many netizens expressed their opposition to this practice of buyers, believing that buyers abused the "seven-day no reason to return" rule, which is selfish and immoral, which not only seriously damages the interests of merchants, but also affects the honest market environment.
The reporter of "Rule of Law Daily" learned from an interview that the high return rate has become a prominent problem for some e-commerce platforms. According to the Law on the Protection of Consumer Rights and Interests, except for special goods, if the operator sells the goods through the Internet, television, telephone, mail order, etc., the consumer has the right to return the goods within seven days from the date of receipt of the goods, without the need to explain the reasons. However, in order to obtain improper benefits, some consumers wantonly use rules such as "seven-day no reason to return" in online shopping to "pick up wool", which makes some merchants complain.
The interviewed experts believe that consumers should follow the principle of good faith when returning goods without reason, and should not use the rules of return without reason to harm the legitimate rights and interests of operators and other consumers. E-commerce platforms and regulatory authorities shall actively improve policies, strengthen regulation, and improve technology, to jointly maintain a fair, healthy, and orderly online shopping environment.
Returned when the online purchase is used up
The owner of the online store has a hard time
In June this year, Mr. Wang, an online store owner from Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, encountered a large number of customer requests to return goods - on the eve of the International Children's Day, some parents went to his online store to buy children's shoes to meet the needs of their children to participate in the festival. After the event, some parents returned their shoes, some of which were badly worn.
"Something like this happens every year. This phenomenon is not limited to individual consumers, but also individual schools order clothing in bulk and return most of the clothing after the event. Mr. Wang said angrily.
The reporter interviewed and found that due to the differences in individual body and aesthetics, the return rate of clothing products has remained high, especially women's clothing is the "hardest hit area". There are even people who specialize in how to return the clothes they wear to the merchant and show off their "success stories" online.
Some sellers reported that the general platform requires "seven days no reason to return", and there is shipping insurance, so buyers can return goods without any loss. But for sellers, the returned goods have to be reprocessed, packaged, and courier, and the loss of a single order may have to sell 10 orders to come back.
Chen Dong, a lawyer at Beijing Yinghe Law Firm, who has long been concerned about the field of e-commerce, said that the original intention of introducing the "seven-day no reason to return" rule is to enable online consumers to enjoy the same opportunity to inspect and try goods as those shopping in physical shopping malls, so as to decide whether to make transactions independently, so as to fully protect consumers' right to know and choose.
Chen Dong said that the scope of application of this rule is goods sold through non-face-to-face sales methods such as the Internet, television, telephone, mail order, etc., and there are also "four plus one" situations that do not apply to "seven-day no reason to return", including fresh and perishable goods such as fruits and vegetables, and digital products downloaded online.
In order to protect the rights and interests of consumers, the "seven-day no-reason return" rule has been extended from online to offline, and many large supermarkets and brand chain stores have made no-reason return commitments, and some have also extended the return period from seven days to 30 days.
In reality, some people use this rule to return goods "willfully", and some people buy authentic clothing in online stores and falsely return them for various reasons to seek illegal benefits.
In March this year, the Shanghai Changning police received a report from the staff of a sports brand in the jurisdiction, saying that when combing through online sales orders, they found that some people bought shoes, clothes and other goods in large quantities on multiple platforms, and then applied for return on the grounds that the goods received had quality problems or were wrong, but the actual returned goods were second-hand defective products of the same style or low-priced goods of the same brand, and the order amount was large.
After investigation, Yang and Zhang cooperated to purchase second-hand shoes, which were refurbished and repaired and then sold. In order to seek greater benefits, the two bought the same sneakers from the official online store many times, and returned the second-hand old shoes to the merchant after receiving the express delivery, and the new shoes were listed on the second-hand trading platform and sold at a price of about 6% off. As of the time of the case, the two had transferred more than 100 contracts and illegally made more than 20,000 yuan.
Take advantage of the shipping cost to get wool
The cost is very low, and the benefits are not small
"In the fierce market competition, the cycle of low profits forces e-commerce to lower prices, but too low prices will lead to poor quality of some products, resulting in high return rates, which will increase the cost of e-commerce operators, forming a vicious circle." Chen Dong said that in addition, the setting of freight insurance provides convenience for consumers, which is also one of the reasons for the increase in return rates.
Fang Jianhua, the founder of a women's clothing brand, recently issued an article calling for attention to "mandatory freight insurance". He believes that in the case of the return rate of e-commerce platforms is generally as high as 60%, the opening of freight insurance has become a mandatory requirement for merchants to participate in major promotion activities, which has brought a huge burden to merchants.
He roughly calculated an account: a return order in the garment industry will cost about 15 yuan without actual benefits, which is equivalent to the merchant's advertising costs, packaging materials, and express delivery fees. If the sales volume is 10 million yuan, the customer order is 200 yuan, and 40% of the returns are conservatively calculated, the loss cost will be as high as more than 300,000 yuan.
The reporter searched on a social platform and found that there are many bloggers on how to "get the wool of freight insurance" - taking advantage of the loopholes in freight insurance to earn the difference between the return courier fee and the freight insurance compensation by placing an order and then returning the goods.
For example, after the buyer buys from the live broadcast room, he can find a cheap express delivery to return the goods, such as returning the goods at a price of 5 yuan, but he can receive a subsidy of 10 yuan for freight insurance, so as to get a price difference of 5 yuan. The more you have, the more you earn.
When encountering this kind of buyer, the merchant is often in a rut. According to industry insiders, some people rent warehouses to start the business of collecting wool for freight insurance. This business is operated on a large scale, and "the profits are very considerable".
Some merchants told reporters that the platform is actually cracking down on such users, and if they identify abnormal returns and return rates, they will restrict their consumption permissions, and they will be banned in serious cases. However, the cost of registering a new user is very low, and the "Wool Party" will continue to register new e-commerce accounts with wholesale numbers to continue to collect shipping insurance.
"The act of collecting freight insurance wool is essentially for the purpose of illegal possession, creating insurance accidents through false transactions, and defrauding insurance money, which undermines the market order and damages the interests of businesses operating in good faith." Lian Dayou, director of Beijing Jingben Law Firm, believes that in the long run, such behavior may lead to an increase in the cost of freight insurance, and the final economic loss will be borne by all consumers and merchants.
"Once the freight insurance policy is tightened, it will hurt the rights and interests of consumers to return and exchange goods normally, and the sales of merchants will also be affected." Lian Dayou suggested that the existing freight insurance policies should be comprehensively investigated, loopholes should be identified and filled, the scope and conditions of the use of freight insurance should be clearly defined, and the penalties for insurance fraud should be increased, and the cost of violations should be increased to form an effective deterrent. It should also make full use of big data and artificial intelligence technology to quickly identify abnormal transaction behaviors and ensure that the platform can detect and crack down on freight insurance wool behaviors in a timely manner.
In the interview, the reporter found that there are also individual consumers aiming at the packaging cartons carefully prepared by the merchants. They take advantage of the platform's return rules and choose to return the goods as soon as they receive them, mostly because they "don't want it anymore". When the merchant received the return, he found that the original carton was missing and replaced with a thin layer of bubble wrap.
"In the face of this situation, it is often difficult for us to find an effective legal basis when defending our rights, and we can only bear the economic losses caused by the return in vain, and we have to spend a lot of time and energy to deal with the return matters." Some merchants said.
Honest and trustworthy and rational consumption
Maintain a good consumption environment
The "Regulations for the Implementation of the Law on the Protection of the Rights and Interests of People's Republic of China Consumers", which came into effect on July 1 this year, stipulates that consumers who return goods without reason shall follow the principle of good faith, and shall not use the rule of return without reason to harm the legitimate rights and interests of operators and other consumers.
"The above-mentioned provisions are newly added, and their purpose is to regulate the long-standing abuse of the right to return goods without reason, and to clarify that the principle of good faith is the fundamental principle of legislation on the right to return goods without reason." Lian Dayou said.
Chen Yinjiang, deputy secretary-general of the Consumer Rights Protection Law Research Association of the China Law Society, introduced that the "seven-day no reason to return" rule is to protect the legitimate rights and interests of consumers, but the law also stipulates that if the goods returned by consumers have been used or affected the secondary sales, the merchant can refuse to return.
Chen Yinjiang said that merchants should implement the provisions of "seven-day no reason to return" in accordance with the law, and those who meet the conditions for return should be returned and refunded in a timely manner; For those who do not meet the conditions for return, they can refuse to return after giving reasonable reasons, especially if they cannot resell the goods that have been used or have obvious defects to other consumers.
Lian Dayou believes that consumers and business operators are both market transaction entities, and they should follow the most basic market transaction rules, be honest and trustworthy, and consume rationally. When a consumer unreasonably abuses the right to return goods without reason and causes damage to the legitimate rights and interests of the operator, the operator may require the consumer to bear the corresponding tort liability according to the specific circumstances.
"Consumers should do sufficient market research before shopping to understand the quality, price and other information of the product, so as to make an informed choice." Lian Dayou called on e-commerce platforms and regulatory authorities to actively improve policies, strengthen supervision, and improve technology, so as to jointly maintain a fair, healthy and orderly online shopping environment.
Chen Yinjiang suggested that the regulatory authorities and consumer associations should increase the publicity of relevant laws and regulations and consumer knowledge, guide businesses to operate in good faith and abide by the law, and guide consumers to consume rationally and protect their rights in accordance with the law.
Author: Wen Yuanhao, all-media reporter of the Rule of Law Daily
Source: Rule of Law Daily