Amazon is now accepting returns in some of its Go stores - and it\'s a brilliant strategy to slash logistics costs

 

Amazon is now accepting returns on purchases made online in its some of its Amazon Go stores, Business Insider has learned.

To make a return, Amazon customers select the product they'd like to return in the Amazon app and select an Amazon Go store. It's free and doesn't require any packaging or boxes.

Then, the customer receives a QR code in the app or via email. An Amazon Go employee scans the code and the return is processed.

Amazon did not provide a comment or confirmation in time for publication.

Amazon accepts returns in its 19 Amazon Books locations and three Amazon 4-star stores. Amazon Hub Lockers and Kohl's 1,150-plus locations also accept returns. But as recently as June 2019, Amazon Go stores, which opened publicly in early 2018, couldn't process returns.

Not all of the 15 cashierless stores - which are in Seattle, Chicago, San Francisco, and New York City - are accepting returns. An Amazon Go employee told Business Insider that only two of the three New York locations can process returns.

Here's why processing returns in-store could slash Amazon's transportation costs

Customers who made returns at Amazon Go locations said on Twitter that the convenience of showing a QR code to make a return was a win. 

Nearly 60% of Americans prefer returning purchases to a physical store rather than mailing in their product, according to a UPS study.

Amazon's push for more in-store deliveries isn't just a boon for customer satisfaction - it has the potential to slash the massive retailer's "ballooning" transportation costs. Amazon's worldwide shipping costs have grown fifteenfold from 2009 to 2018, while net sales have only increased by sevenfold in the same time.

Returns are cheaper for retailers when made in stores. According to AlixPartners, the returns process costs retailers $3 per package when customers return them to a store.

But when a customer mails the package back, retailers spend up to $6 per return.

Some retailers outsource the cumbersome process of "reverse logistics." And that's even pricier - it costs $8 per return when returned to a third-party processor.

While they're not at all free for the retailers themselves, free returns are becoming the norm for most customers. Between 10% to 30% of goods purchased online are returned, depending on the sector, according to an XPO study.

Because of the quickly rising cost of managing those returns, retail analysts say companies are starting to invest more and more into seeing where returns can be made in-store rather than through the mail. That explains Amazon's recent push to allow returns in its Go locales. 

"Retailers need to put some guardrails around free returns," Antony Karabus, CEO at HRC Retail Advisory, previously told Business Insider. "They're beginning to realize that free returns and free shipping is killing them."