Amazon Stops Returns On Custom & Personalized Items
Amazon announced today that effective February 15, 2023, custom and personalized products will no longer be eligible for returns.
Sellers discussed the change in the new Amazon Seller Forums (side note: the new forum experience is, shall we say "less than optimal" - yikes! 😲)
Starting February 15, 2023, custom and personalized products purchased on Amazon will no longer be eligible for returns.
We know it can be difficult to accept returns of customized products as they may be hard to reuse or resell. This policy makes it clear to customers that their customized product purchases are final and saves you from manually authorizing returns requests.
Custom products ineligible for returns include those that are made to order or personalized with names, designs, or inscriptions. For more information on product customization, go to Amazon Custom.
To learn more about items eligible for returns, go to About Our Returns Policies.
The number one seller concerns seems to be that this will simply cause buyers to find other ways to force returns, by opening cases or leaving negative feedback or reviews.
That is a pointless policy. Customers will leverage ODR, product reviews, etc to get what they want because "font is too small" or they "ordered by mistake" while uploading three images, placing three texts, etc.
This is a useless policy and it will create more problems than solutions. Customers will now open cases which will directly hurt the sellers even further. Here comes high ODR and more negative feedbacks. Great job Amazon.
Curious how items that are damaged in transit will be handled.
It sounds like if an ASIN is enrolled into customization, return requests are not possible. So if a custom item is damaged in transit, will the buyer need to contact Amazon Customer Service? Will Amazon CS be able to raise a replacement order, or will everything have to be handled via the messaging system?
What do you think of Amazon's new policy on custom and personalized items? Let us know in the comments below!
