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Real Life UX: Returning Items to Amazon Makes Me Smile

102 points by jason_shah 14y ago

deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
jason_shah 14y ago
Amazon really blows me away with their end-to-end experience. The funny thing is that their site's UX leaves much to be desired, but it's highly functional and they still have a world-class brand even without a world-class frontend for Amazon.com. We obsess over our web app's front-end design, but often neglect the end-to-end experience.
- notatoad 14y ago
  Their site's UX is amazing. The aesthetic design could use some work, but the actual interaction and interface design on amazon is pretty great. Their goal isn't to look pretty, it's to sell stuff. There have been many times when i've been looking at something on amazon, clicked the one-click purchase button, and then hours later realized i wasn't really sure i wanted to buy it, Amazon just makes it far too easy to give them my money.
  - chaud 14y ago
    Compare their site to Newegg for purchasing computer hardware. Newegg's filtering system blows Amazon's away, making it possible to easily find what you are looking for. Amazon likes to give me similar hardware when I search for a part, cluttering up the results with things I don't want. If I search for a 7850 GPU, I don't want results for a 6950, 7950, 6870, 7770, 7870, Intel 3570K CPU, GTX 670, Intel 2500K CPU, GTX 480, 6850, GTX 560 Ti, and GTX 560. That was all just on the first page of search results. Granted, you do want similar products in other cases, but the same kind of failure applies elsewhere. Another annoying thing is the duplicate items as separate listings. Sometimes I will go and look for something like a Water Filter replacement and find 3 or 4 different listings for the product with multiple sellers under each. Using Amazon to find a specific product is an unpleasant experience. Thankfully once you find the product you are looking for everything else is great.
- majormajor 14y ago
  Could you elaborate on how you think their site's experience leaves much to be desired despite being highly functional? I'm having trouble thinking of any time when I thought to myself "boy, I hate the process Amazon makes me take to do this task" and isn't that really what it's all about?
  - jason_shah 14y ago
    That's true in many ways. The actual site's UX isn't bad per se because it's pretty easy to find what you want, buy it, manage the order, etc. And yes, that's what "it's all about" at the end of the day. I think I was caught in a little bit of Silicon Valley myopic thinking since their site isn't shiny and that's what is mistakenly considered as interchangeable with good UI design these days. That being said, Amazon.com the site does still need to improve UX in a couple key areas. Compared to more contemporary e-commerce sites, the ability to compare items and make sense of ratings (i.e. the flaws of the 5 star rating system) is where they need to make the most improvement IMHO. It may have been an overstatement to say "their site leaves much to be desired" in all fairness.
    - caffeine5150 14y ago
      It seems like there are easy improvements to search by ratings they could make. If I am browsing for a new book, I'd like to be able to search by number of reviews alone. Anything with more than 500 or so reviews is probably worth taking a look at. I also would like to filter out items with less than 'x' reviews or search by a ratio of number of reviews to the number of stars. This might hurt products trying to get off the ground, but I'd really like it as a user.
  - waterlesscloud 14y ago
    The main area I have complaint with is the discovery process for finding digital videos to watch. Once you've used something like Netflix, the Amazon process is awful.
    - majormajor 14y ago
melvinmt 14y ago
> So I bought both - confident that I would return whichever one was inferior or the more expensive one if the cheaper one showed up on time. And people wonder why there's global warming.
- coderdude 14y ago
  Global warming aside, what a pain in the ass customer. He was decided from the get-go that he would be a customer service issue for Amazon. @jason_shah There are worse things to be than a pain in the ass customer, so please don't think of this as an insult to your character.
  - crdoconnor 14y ago
    They got some good PR out of it though.
  - jason_shah 14y ago
    No offense taken. Your point is fair. I do think this should be a calculated cost of business for Amazon, and I would buy less on Amazon if I didn't have the convenience that's offered to me by occasionally ordering similar items and expecting to most likely return one without a hassle. That being said, I honestly didn't think all that much of the broader economic and environmental impact of my consumer behavior in this case and appreciate the comments reminding me of it. Thanks.
  - polyfractal 14y ago
    To be fair, you could easily see this as one of Amazon's "features", much like Zappos. Everyone orders from Zappos knowing that they can not only return shoes for free, but that it is usually encouraged to buy several and return the ones you don't want. While Amazon isn't quite so blatant about that "feature", their incredibly awesome customer support, zero-hassle returns encourage this kind of behavior...effectively making it a feature. And to be honest, it's an awesome feature.
    - gav 14y ago
GuiA 14y ago
Amazon is the most amazing company I've ever dealt with. Once, I've had a package stolen from my doorstep, and they replaced it free of charge (fortunately it was just $5 guitar strings). Last year, I bought a camera with a 18-35mm lens ($500) a week or so before leaving for vacation. It arrives 2 days later (thanks prime), but unfortunately Amazon Warehouse had shipped me the bundle with a 15mm lens. I contact their support right away— they propose that I return the camera and they send me the original 18-35mm bundle, but I tell the lady that I'm leaving in 3 days and would like to have the camera for my vacation. She talks with her supervisor, and 2 days later I get the 18-35mm lens in the mail (~$200 value) and they tell me I can keep the 15mm lens. I spend a couple of hundred dollars at Amazon each month (research books are expensive), which is probably why I got such a great treatment— but I was pretty blown away.
- ricardobeat 14y ago
  Do you mean something else instead of 15mm? That would be a huge gift. A 15mm fisheye costs around a thousand bucks, the Canon 15-85mm ~$600.
  - GuiA 14y ago
    Oops, typo. It's a 14mm pancake (micro 4/3 format)
- culturestate 14y ago
  I had a similar experience, except it was a MacBook Air stolen from my doorstep. They overnighted a replacement immediately with no questions asked (other than, "did you check with your neighbors?") Your point about the service level relating to your customer history is a good one, though - I've spent upwards of $50,000 with Amazon in the last 3 or 4 years, so the real test would be how they'd react to a new customer in the same situation.
  - marisela_arias 14y ago
    Packages are insured so, unless they suspect fraud, they will let insurance cover it. Consumers usually pay FedEx for insurance when we need a package but I bet Amazon self insures, given their size. Either way, money is set aside to cover situations like this.
ck2 14y ago
Amazon has amazing customer service. However browsing items for a particular category on their site is not so easy. When you go to a specific item, you should be able to see what categories it's stored in, and then browse those categories directly (like breadcrumbs). But that's impossible on Amazon. They seem to have the ability though - if you pick a part that is not for your particular car, it will show you what categories it's in. They should make that option for all items.
- Terretta 14y ago
  Scroll down the page. All the classification hierarchies are there. And they're even linked breadcrumbs exactly as you wish.
  - ck2 14y ago
    omg, I cannot believe I've missed that for so many years "Look for Similar Items by Category" right near the bottom - I guess I never make it that far down the page!
bonsaitree 14y ago
Amazon is fabulous, but that sort of real-time return policy workflow is for relatively low-mass & low-expense items from high-volume retailers. Try returning custom car parts or, really, anything close to $1k USD which essentially mandates shipping insurance. That said, I love-love the instant UPS-label "pick-up at your office or home" return workflow for the majority of stuff I buy from them. The item is here in two days (Primed) and if I need the rare return, it's, at most, about 5 minutes worth of my time & attention. It's such a total win over the typical retail process for non-bespoke items.
kevinsd 14y ago
This guy is ripping off Amazon. You are supposed to pay a cost when your return is not due to Amazon's fault or item's defect. If a significant amount of people keep doing this, Amazon will have to raise the price for all of us.
- primatology 14y ago
  I assure you Amazon is well aware of this practice and current prices account for the small minority of customers who shop like this.
- gav 14y ago
  This isn't really true. All the retailers I've worked with (both brick & mortar and internet-only) see returns as a small cost of doing business. An easy returns process makes customers happy and keeps down credit card chargebacks. If you are selling on the internet, handling a small percentage of returns is considerably cheaper than having a retail presence. You can look at Zappos (now owned by Amazon) for having an amazing liberal return policy. you have 365 days to return things and they pay for the return shipping. It's all to give you a safe feeling and buy multiple items. In most cases large retailers force their vendors to cover the costs of returned merchandise that they can't resell (due to opened packaging etc). One of the main reasons I'll buy from Amazon is that the transaction carries zero risk for me. If there is any problem whatsoever I know it's going to be resolved to my benefit.
  - caffeine5150 14y ago
    > In most cases large retailers force their vendors to cover the costs of returned merchandise that they can't resell (due to opened packaging etc). Yes, and this can increase costs to the consumer. Cost is cost. It has to be born by someone in the chain and it's pushed on to the consumer if possible (granted in the competitive retail space it's harder to make consumers absorb costs).
- baddox 14y ago
  > If a significant amount of people keep doing this, Amazon will have to raise the price for all of us. No, I suspect that Amazon's prices already account for the estimated number and cost of returns.
mgl 14y ago
It's amazing that actually nobody noticed, including the author, the real problem which are vague descriptions of delivery dates, especially for international shippments. This made him to order two different items at the same time as he had no option to either evaluate shippment time in a more precise way or make a conditional FIFO-driven order. And this is the actual flaw in Amazon UX.
- rogerbinns 14y ago
  And also that it wasn't possible to discern the practical differences between two products where one cost twice what the other did.
delinquentme 14y ago
+1 for TLDR.
nodata 14y ago
Amazon has a great returns policy, and good, fast customer service. Amazon lacks in the following areas (covered in another post): 1. The price filter doesn't really work. 2. Sorting doesn't work unless you choose a category (many items are miscategorised or match multiple categories) 3. Backwards shipping policy "What the heck, let's order it for tomorrow" on an ordered item often doesn't work because it's too late. 4. The ratings system gives too much weight to lightly-reviewed items. 5. Often the dispatch date for an order is shown on the checkout page, the expected delivery date would be better. Amazon AA batteries? 5 week delivery. Ouch.
frenger 14y ago
Sounded good at first but then started sounding like an advert written by a social media promotions company
- binarysolo 14y ago
  It's Jason Shaw, a fairly avid blogger.
gringomorcego 14y ago
I wish Jeff Bezos quit being such a dictating dick when it came to the home page. I mean seriously, I fucking love amazon, why the hell is it so fucking unintuitive and feel like a time traveling 95 site.
zht 14y ago
I worked for Amazon, and focusing on the customer experience is something that permeates its culture (at least in fulfillment). It's not even just having good customer service/returns, ensuring the best customer service even permeated through our code.
yifanlu 14y ago
Once I bought the most expensive Vita bundle on Amazon and a day before shipping they included some free stuff with the cheaper bundle (I think it was a Sony decision because other stores did the same). I sent a email to them simply asking why this was the case and they sent me $50 credit with no questions asked.
kazuya 14y ago
Or try think this way - your doorstep is part of Amazon's storefront. Even though you have to make a deposite and wait much longer than real retails before perusing the goods at hand, you think they have great customer service. Genuinely interesting, with no sarcasm.
mwexler 14y ago
Not to derail all these comments about Amazon, but I think Jason's reminder that UX is just a subset of overall "CX" or customer experience is a good one. I spend a bunch of time reminding folks that they can't just look at one page, or one set of functionality in a vacuum, but instead need to see the cohesive whole, from the first ad a person sees to the quality of some autogenerated confirm message. It all counts. Functionality and design, btw, can be awesome, but if it's wrapped around a defective business process, you will still suffer. Making users jump through hoops, even hoops of diamonds and gold with ergonomic handles, can still suck.
ernesth 14y ago
What is amazing in this? Returning goods bought by mail order or online is the most basic service sellers have to implement. Refund if the product is not open and is returned at most seven days after purchase is guaranteed by law. If it is open a reason such as "does not fit" should be enough to be refunded. Or is it the fact that the customer was refunded before amazon received the parcel? I am not impressed as my bank account is debited once a month, which means I usually still have my money when I send an item back to the seller! It was already like that when I was buying things (especially clothing) through mail order twenty years ago. Or is it only in my country?

102 points by jason_shah 14y ago

deleted 14y ago

[deleted]

Amazon really blows me away with their end-to-end experience. The funny thing is that their site's UX leaves much to be desired, but it's highly functional and they still have a world-class brand even without a world-class frontend for Amazon.com. We obsess over our web app's front-end design, but often neglect the end-to-end experience.

notatoad 14y ago
Their site's UX is amazing. The aesthetic design could use some work, but the actual interaction and interface design on amazon is pretty great. Their goal isn't to look pretty, it's to sell stuff. There have been many times when i've been looking at something on amazon, clicked the one-click purchase button, and then hours later realized i wasn't really sure i wanted to buy it, Amazon just makes it far too easy to give them my money.
- chaud 14y ago
  Compare their site to Newegg for purchasing computer hardware. Newegg's filtering system blows Amazon's away, making it possible to easily find what you are looking for. Amazon likes to give me similar hardware when I search for a part, cluttering up the results with things I don't want. If I search for a 7850 GPU, I don't want results for a 6950, 7950, 6870, 7770, 7870, Intel 3570K CPU, GTX 670, Intel 2500K CPU, GTX 480, 6850, GTX 560 Ti, and GTX 560. That was all just on the first page of search results. Granted, you do want similar products in other cases, but the same kind of failure applies elsewhere. Another annoying thing is the duplicate items as separate listings. Sometimes I will go and look for something like a Water Filter replacement and find 3 or 4 different listings for the product with multiple sellers under each. Using Amazon to find a specific product is an unpleasant experience. Thankfully once you find the product you are looking for everything else is great.
majormajor 14y ago
Could you elaborate on how you think their site's experience leaves much to be desired despite being highly functional? I'm having trouble thinking of any time when I thought to myself "boy, I hate the process Amazon makes me take to do this task" and isn't that really what it's all about?
- jason_shah 14y ago
  That's true in many ways. The actual site's UX isn't bad per se because it's pretty easy to find what you want, buy it, manage the order, etc. And yes, that's what "it's all about" at the end of the day. I think I was caught in a little bit of Silicon Valley myopic thinking since their site isn't shiny and that's what is mistakenly considered as interchangeable with good UI design these days. That being said, Amazon.com the site does still need to improve UX in a couple key areas. Compared to more contemporary e-commerce sites, the ability to compare items and make sense of ratings (i.e. the flaws of the 5 star rating system) is where they need to make the most improvement IMHO. It may have been an overstatement to say "their site leaves much to be desired" in all fairness.
  - caffeine5150 14y ago
    It seems like there are easy improvements to search by ratings they could make. If I am browsing for a new book, I'd like to be able to search by number of reviews alone. Anything with more than 500 or so reviews is probably worth taking a look at. I also would like to filter out items with less than 'x' reviews or search by a ratio of number of reviews to the number of stars. This might hurt products trying to get off the ground, but I'd really like it as a user.
- waterlesscloud 14y ago
  The main area I have complaint with is the discovery process for finding digital videos to watch. Once you've used something like Netflix, the Amazon process is awful.
  - majormajor 14y ago

melvinmt 14y ago

> So I bought both - confident that I would return whichever one was inferior or the more expensive one if the cheaper one showed up on time. And people wonder why there's global warming.

coderdude 14y ago
Global warming aside, what a pain in the ass customer. He was decided from the get-go that he would be a customer service issue for Amazon. @jason_shah There are worse things to be than a pain in the ass customer, so please don't think of this as an insult to your character.
- crdoconnor 14y ago
  They got some good PR out of it though.
- jason_shah 14y ago
  No offense taken. Your point is fair. I do think this should be a calculated cost of business for Amazon, and I would buy less on Amazon if I didn't have the convenience that's offered to me by occasionally ordering similar items and expecting to most likely return one without a hassle. That being said, I honestly didn't think all that much of the broader economic and environmental impact of my consumer behavior in this case and appreciate the comments reminding me of it. Thanks.
- polyfractal 14y ago
  To be fair, you could easily see this as one of Amazon's "features", much like Zappos. Everyone orders from Zappos knowing that they can not only return shoes for free, but that it is usually encouraged to buy several and return the ones you don't want. While Amazon isn't quite so blatant about that "feature", their incredibly awesome customer support, zero-hassle returns encourage this kind of behavior...effectively making it a feature. And to be honest, it's an awesome feature.
  - gav 14y ago

GuiA 14y ago

Amazon is the most amazing company I've ever dealt with. Once, I've had a package stolen from my doorstep, and they replaced it free of charge (fortunately it was just $5 guitar strings). Last year, I bought a camera with a 18-35mm lens ($500) a week or so before leaving for vacation. It arrives 2 days later (thanks prime), but unfortunately Amazon Warehouse had shipped me the bundle with a 15mm lens. I contact their support right away— they propose that I return the camera and they send me the original 18-35mm bundle, but I tell the lady that I'm leaving in 3 days and would like to have the camera for my vacation. She talks with her supervisor, and 2 days later I get the 18-35mm lens in the mail (~$200 value) and they tell me I can keep the 15mm lens. I spend a couple of hundred dollars at Amazon each month (research books are expensive), which is probably why I got such a great treatment— but I was pretty blown away.

ricardobeat 14y ago
Do you mean something else instead of 15mm? That would be a huge gift. A 15mm fisheye costs around a thousand bucks, the Canon 15-85mm ~$600.
- GuiA 14y ago
  Oops, typo. It's a 14mm pancake (micro 4/3 format)
culturestate 14y ago
I had a similar experience, except it was a MacBook Air stolen from my doorstep. They overnighted a replacement immediately with no questions asked (other than, "did you check with your neighbors?") Your point about the service level relating to your customer history is a good one, though - I've spent upwards of $50,000 with Amazon in the last 3 or 4 years, so the real test would be how they'd react to a new customer in the same situation.
- marisela_arias 14y ago
  Packages are insured so, unless they suspect fraud, they will let insurance cover it. Consumers usually pay FedEx for insurance when we need a package but I bet Amazon self insures, given their size. Either way, money is set aside to cover situations like this.

ck2 14y ago

Amazon has amazing customer service. However browsing items for a particular category on their site is not so easy. When you go to a specific item, you should be able to see what categories it's stored in, and then browse those categories directly (like breadcrumbs). But that's impossible on Amazon. They seem to have the ability though - if you pick a part that is not for your particular car, it will show you what categories it's in. They should make that option for all items.

Terretta 14y ago
Scroll down the page. All the classification hierarchies are there. And they're even linked breadcrumbs exactly as you wish.
- ck2 14y ago
  omg, I cannot believe I've missed that for so many years "Look for Similar Items by Category" right near the bottom - I guess I never make it that far down the page!

bonsaitree 14y ago

Amazon is fabulous, but that sort of real-time return policy workflow is for relatively low-mass & low-expense items from high-volume retailers. Try returning custom car parts or, really, anything close to $1k USD which essentially mandates shipping insurance. That said, I love-love the instant UPS-label "pick-up at your office or home" return workflow for the majority of stuff I buy from them. The item is here in two days (Primed) and if I need the rare return, it's, at most, about 5 minutes worth of my time & attention. It's such a total win over the typical retail process for non-bespoke items.

kevinsd 14y ago

This guy is ripping off Amazon. You are supposed to pay a cost when your return is not due to Amazon's fault or item's defect. If a significant amount of people keep doing this, Amazon will have to raise the price for all of us.

primatology 14y ago
I assure you Amazon is well aware of this practice and current prices account for the small minority of customers who shop like this.
gav 14y ago
This isn't really true. All the retailers I've worked with (both brick & mortar and internet-only) see returns as a small cost of doing business. An easy returns process makes customers happy and keeps down credit card chargebacks. If you are selling on the internet, handling a small percentage of returns is considerably cheaper than having a retail presence. You can look at Zappos (now owned by Amazon) for having an amazing liberal return policy. you have 365 days to return things and they pay for the return shipping. It's all to give you a safe feeling and buy multiple items. In most cases large retailers force their vendors to cover the costs of returned merchandise that they can't resell (due to opened packaging etc). One of the main reasons I'll buy from Amazon is that the transaction carries zero risk for me. If there is any problem whatsoever I know it's going to be resolved to my benefit.
- caffeine5150 14y ago
  > In most cases large retailers force their vendors to cover the costs of returned merchandise that they can't resell (due to opened packaging etc). Yes, and this can increase costs to the consumer. Cost is cost. It has to be born by someone in the chain and it's pushed on to the consumer if possible (granted in the competitive retail space it's harder to make consumers absorb costs).
baddox 14y ago
> If a significant amount of people keep doing this, Amazon will have to raise the price for all of us. No, I suspect that Amazon's prices already account for the estimated number and cost of returns.

mgl 14y ago

It's amazing that actually nobody noticed, including the author, the real problem which are vague descriptions of delivery dates, especially for international shippments. This made him to order two different items at the same time as he had no option to either evaluate shippment time in a more precise way or make a conditional FIFO-driven order. And this is the actual flaw in Amazon UX.

rogerbinns 14y ago
And also that it wasn't possible to discern the practical differences between two products where one cost twice what the other did.

delinquentme 14y ago

+1 for TLDR.

nodata 14y ago

Amazon has a great returns policy, and good, fast customer service. Amazon lacks in the following areas (covered in another post): 1. The price filter doesn't really work. 2. Sorting doesn't work unless you choose a category (many items are miscategorised or match multiple categories) 3. Backwards shipping policy "What the heck, let's order it for tomorrow" on an ordered item often doesn't work because it's too late. 4. The ratings system gives too much weight to lightly-reviewed items. 5. Often the dispatch date for an order is shown on the checkout page, the expected delivery date would be better. Amazon AA batteries? 5 week delivery. Ouch.

frenger 14y ago

Sounded good at first but then started sounding like an advert written by a social media promotions company

binarysolo 14y ago
It's Jason Shaw, a fairly avid blogger.

gringomorcego 14y ago

I wish Jeff Bezos quit being such a dictating dick when it came to the home page. I mean seriously, I fucking love amazon, why the hell is it so fucking unintuitive and feel like a time traveling 95 site.

zht 14y ago

I worked for Amazon, and focusing on the customer experience is something that permeates its culture (at least in fulfillment). It's not even just having good customer service/returns, ensuring the best customer service even permeated through our code.

yifanlu 14y ago

Once I bought the most expensive Vita bundle on Amazon and a day before shipping they included some free stuff with the cheaper bundle (I think it was a Sony decision because other stores did the same). I sent a email to them simply asking why this was the case and they sent me $50 credit with no questions asked.

kazuya 14y ago

Or try think this way - your doorstep is part of Amazon's storefront. Even though you have to make a deposite and wait much longer than real retails before perusing the goods at hand, you think they have great customer service. Genuinely interesting, with no sarcasm.

mwexler 14y ago

Not to derail all these comments about Amazon, but I think Jason's reminder that UX is just a subset of overall "CX" or customer experience is a good one. I spend a bunch of time reminding folks that they can't just look at one page, or one set of functionality in a vacuum, but instead need to see the cohesive whole, from the first ad a person sees to the quality of some autogenerated confirm message. It all counts. Functionality and design, btw, can be awesome, but if it's wrapped around a defective business process, you will still suffer. Making users jump through hoops, even hoops of diamonds and gold with ergonomic handles, can still suck.

ernesth 14y ago

What is amazing in this? Returning goods bought by mail order or online is the most basic service sellers have to implement. Refund if the product is not open and is returned at most seven days after purchase is guaranteed by law. If it is open a reason such as "does not fit" should be enough to be refunded. Or is it the fact that the customer was refunded before amazon received the parcel? I am not impressed as my bank account is debited once a month, which means I usually still have my money when I send an item back to the seller! It was already like that when I was buying things (especially clothing) through mail order twenty years ago. Or is it only in my country?