Ecommerce Encyclopedia

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How to write a great return policy

Return policies could be defined as the rules which are used by mainly businesses who established them so as to manage the return or exchange process of unwanted or defective products from previous customers.

1. RETURN POLICY TEMPLATE

Generally, a return policy should include those elements:

  • General guidelines.
  • Time allowed for a return.
  • Specific items applied.
  • Shipping charges (if included)
  • Other requirements.

2. HOW TO PRACTICE A GREAT RETURN POLICY FOR YOUR BUSINESS

  • Educate your employees first

Make sure all of your staff are up to date with your return policy and procedures so as to bring out great customer support, thus enhancing a shopper’s experience with your business. A happy customer will eventually become a repeat customer, thus increasing your customer lifetime value (CLV).

  • Play fair

To put it simply, admit your mistakes. If you mess up, do apologize to your customers and try to fix it. The same goes for other cases such as wrong item or broken item during shipment. Send them another one, and don’t forget to apologize. Of course, you also have to be wise to know when should you apologize and when you should not.

  • Don’t make orders

Stay away from using those phrases like “you must” and “you are required”. Also, do not use the phrase “We are not responsible for ABC”. You are scaring your customers.

To put it simply, do make sure your return process is made as much simple as possible, just like how you want the purchase process to be. 

It might sound daunting, but always keep in mind that customers are always right.

  • Never copy and paste policies from other businesses

While you could (though not really recommended) copy and paste product descriptions and such from your competitors, it is totally not advisable to just straight copy return policies from them. You have to make it specific to your business and your targeted customers.