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From a consumer point of view, this is a good thing. It sucks to have a different experience depending on whether something ships from Amazon or a third party,

From a consumer point of view, this is a good thing. It sucks to have a different experience depending on whether something ships from Amazon or a third party, especially as their easy return policy is one of the main reasons I continue to use Amazon and pay for Prime. I can understand sellers frustration, but to my mind that's the price of having your products featured on Amazon. I've never encountered a third party who has refused a refund, so in reality I don't know if that much will change for them, unless there's a huge amount of abuse of the returnless refunds.

dawnerd 9y ago
I'm hoping this helps with console resellers. Hard to sell a console 100+ dollars over when someone can just return it when more become available.
tyingq 9y ago
The impact varies greatly by item. Things that are big and expensive to ship. Items that require some skill or patience to use. Items that can't be sold once again once returned. Items that people might use once, so it becomes a free rental.
currymj 9y ago
it's a good thing in the short term, but it also feels like an exercise of monopoly power by Amazon, which is going to be bad for consumers in the long run. can a business afford not to be listed on Amazon? in the long term, does Amazon have any interest in listing third parties? at some point I think the answer to both of these questions will be no, and then I'd expect the good customer experience to erode pretty quickly as Amazon realizes they can squeeze as much profit as they want out of customers and retailers.
- komali2 9y ago
  I would expect that if Amazon stopped listing third party stuff, other sites would pick up the slack there, perhaps sites like Etsy?
  - settsu 9y ago
    Ebay.
    - komali2 9y ago
      Another good example, but I've definitely heard sellers complaining about ebay as well.
      - olyjohn 9y ago
        One of my friends listed 3 pocket knives on eBay. After waiting a week for the auctions to close, 2 out of the 3 buyers said "Cancel my order, I'm not interested." So his auctions were totally screwed over, and he had to wait another week by setting up another auction. One of those re-posts had the EXACT same thing happen. Turns out that eBay won't do anything unless a user has failed to pay for 3 transactions within something like 90 days. That means you can go bid on an item once a month, not pay the seller, and have no repercussions. Because the transaction never completes, you can't leave feedback on the buyer.
- petra 9y ago
  Amazon is interested in listing 3rd parties: it's useful to have someone else take all of the product risk , while you offer the ideal store for your customers and do all the more low-risk parts like logistics, managing a site, selling low-risk products directly while someone else supply excess demand.
  - jasonlaramburu 9y ago
    Frankly I don't see the benefit in this program for Amazon. 3rd party sellers often charge less, meaning less revenue for Amazon. The highly variable customer service also degrades Amazon's brand. Finally, Amazon still has to front the cost of any return/refund from a 3rd party seller, so there is still risk.
- freeone3000 9y ago
  Monopoly power? Please. They're far from the only online retailer; it's not as if online retail has some huge capital barrier to entry. You don't like Amazon? List on ebay, or etsy, or craigslist, or kijiji, or... Or set up your own store and handle payments through Paypal or if you don't like Paypal then Stripe or Moneybookers or... ecommerce is too large a field, with too easy entry, to be a monopoly.
c2h5oh 9y ago
tl;dr; Only Amazon really benefits, buyers will eat the cost and their experience might be worse. Smaller sellers will suffer the most. Mostly it let's Amazon hire fewer people in support department - they don't have to deal with the occasional refused return ("I dropped this glass item on tiles and it broke into a million pieces, I'd like my money back. Do I have to ship it back to you?" - paraphrased actual return request) The only other plus side I see is that customers can ship the return immediately. Not much of a difference as sellers are now required to respond within 12h (7 days a week, including holidays) and if they fail to more than 5-10% of the time (I don't remember what the exact target is now) they risk having their Amazon account closed. From consumer point of view it's not a good thing: - it offers no new customer protection. sellers are already required to accept those returns (unless customer shoots themselves in the foot - see example above) and provide a prepaid shipping label (in most cases). Amazon enforces that - it removes the option seller has to accept a return that is out of policy - it increases the number of unnecessary returns (and having to reorder). Often a one sentence explanation/hint is enough - it doesn't make the cost of shipping to customer refundable, unless the customer lies about the reason why he's returning the item. Right now those false claims account for at least 3/4 of all returns (source: my wife runs a business that does part of the sales through Amazon, other sellers we know having the same problem) - it generates extra costs for sellers. that cost is ultimately paid by buyers From seller point of view it's not a good thing: - makes fraud easier. For a larger seller that's simply a cost of doing business that will be shifted to buyers anyway. For a small seller it can be end of business if for example a Chinese company that copied their product decides to make a couple dozen fraudulent returns (not that uncommon) - removes an option to use your own cheaper shipping label - even sending just a few hundred package a month gets you really nice discounts - removes an option to use your own shipping label that makes the return safer (like extra insurance or using a courier). ANYTHING customer ships back makes Amazon consider it a valid return - even if it's damaged, something completely different, etc the seller will have to provide a refund. It's next to impossible to stop that refund - removes an option to receive feedback from the customer making the return to improve in the future
- threatofrain 9y ago
  I imagine there's a balance to be had somewhere, but offering superior customer assurance also means an increased willingness to buy from smaller vendors. We should ultimately facilitate a marketplace where both business and customer have confidence in their transactions, rather than lingering suspicions that they don't understand the deal and will have to eat the cost.

dawnerd 9y ago

I'm hoping this helps with console resellers. Hard to sell a console 100+ dollars over when someone can just return it when more become available.

tyingq 9y ago

The impact varies greatly by item. Things that are big and expensive to ship. Items that require some skill or patience to use. Items that can't be sold once again once returned. Items that people might use once, so it becomes a free rental.

currymj 9y ago

it's a good thing in the short term, but it also feels like an exercise of monopoly power by Amazon, which is going to be bad for consumers in the long run. can a business afford not to be listed on Amazon? in the long term, does Amazon have any interest in listing third parties? at some point I think the answer to both of these questions will be no, and then I'd expect the good customer experience to erode pretty quickly as Amazon realizes they can squeeze as much profit as they want out of customers and retailers.

komali2 9y ago
I would expect that if Amazon stopped listing third party stuff, other sites would pick up the slack there, perhaps sites like Etsy?
- settsu 9y ago
  Ebay.
  - komali2 9y ago
    Another good example, but I've definitely heard sellers complaining about ebay as well.
    - olyjohn 9y ago
      One of my friends listed 3 pocket knives on eBay. After waiting a week for the auctions to close, 2 out of the 3 buyers said "Cancel my order, I'm not interested." So his auctions were totally screwed over, and he had to wait another week by setting up another auction. One of those re-posts had the EXACT same thing happen. Turns out that eBay won't do anything unless a user has failed to pay for 3 transactions within something like 90 days. That means you can go bid on an item once a month, not pay the seller, and have no repercussions. Because the transaction never completes, you can't leave feedback on the buyer.
petra 9y ago
Amazon is interested in listing 3rd parties: it's useful to have someone else take all of the product risk , while you offer the ideal store for your customers and do all the more low-risk parts like logistics, managing a site, selling low-risk products directly while someone else supply excess demand.
- jasonlaramburu 9y ago
  Frankly I don't see the benefit in this program for Amazon. 3rd party sellers often charge less, meaning less revenue for Amazon. The highly variable customer service also degrades Amazon's brand. Finally, Amazon still has to front the cost of any return/refund from a 3rd party seller, so there is still risk.
freeone3000 9y ago
Monopoly power? Please. They're far from the only online retailer; it's not as if online retail has some huge capital barrier to entry. You don't like Amazon? List on ebay, or etsy, or craigslist, or kijiji, or... Or set up your own store and handle payments through Paypal or if you don't like Paypal then Stripe or Moneybookers or... ecommerce is too large a field, with too easy entry, to be a monopoly.

c2h5oh 9y ago

tl;dr; Only Amazon really benefits, buyers will eat the cost and their experience might be worse. Smaller sellers will suffer the most. Mostly it let's Amazon hire fewer people in support department - they don't have to deal with the occasional refused return ("I dropped this glass item on tiles and it broke into a million pieces, I'd like my money back. Do I have to ship it back to you?" - paraphrased actual return request) The only other plus side I see is that customers can ship the return immediately. Not much of a difference as sellers are now required to respond within 12h (7 days a week, including holidays) and if they fail to more than 5-10% of the time (I don't remember what the exact target is now) they risk having their Amazon account closed. From consumer point of view it's not a good thing: - it offers no new customer protection. sellers are already required to accept those returns (unless customer shoots themselves in the foot - see example above) and provide a prepaid shipping label (in most cases). Amazon enforces that - it removes the option seller has to accept a return that is out of policy - it increases the number of unnecessary returns (and having to reorder). Often a one sentence explanation/hint is enough - it doesn't make the cost of shipping to customer refundable, unless the customer lies about the reason why he's returning the item. Right now those false claims account for at least 3/4 of all returns (source: my wife runs a business that does part of the sales through Amazon, other sellers we know having the same problem) - it generates extra costs for sellers. that cost is ultimately paid by buyers From seller point of view it's not a good thing: - makes fraud easier. For a larger seller that's simply a cost of doing business that will be shifted to buyers anyway. For a small seller it can be end of business if for example a Chinese company that copied their product decides to make a couple dozen fraudulent returns (not that uncommon) - removes an option to use your own cheaper shipping label - even sending just a few hundred package a month gets you really nice discounts - removes an option to use your own shipping label that makes the return safer (like extra insurance or using a courier). ANYTHING customer ships back makes Amazon consider it a valid return - even if it's damaged, something completely different, etc the seller will have to provide a refund. It's next to impossible to stop that refund - removes an option to receive feedback from the customer making the return to improve in the future

threatofrain 9y ago
I imagine there's a balance to be had somewhere, but offering superior customer assurance also means an increased willingness to buy from smaller vendors. We should ultimately facilitate a marketplace where both business and customer have confidence in their transactions, rather than lingering suspicions that they don't understand the deal and will have to eat the cost.