Times are tough but for the small business owner, the pressure to stay in the black is exponentially more difficult. The tiniest of blunders in business practice can become costly and catastrophic. Not paying attention to shipping returns to customers is one of the most commonly overlooked mistakes that have the power to completely shut down an entrepreneur’s dream.
If you are not shipping pallets upon pallets of merchandise (and even if you ARE), consider a third party refund logistics service company to manage your shipping costs to avoid these entrepreneurial blunders.
Key questions a business owner must ask themselves before shipping returns to their customers:
1. Do you have the time and patience to work with the shipping service provider’s small-business specialist (i.e. UPS, FedEx, DHL or USPS) and correctly identify and match each of the requirements that your business needs?
If not, you could spend as much as 40% more in fees and additional shipping expenses than those small businesses who choose to utilize third party refund logistics services.
2. Have you let your customers know when they are expected to pay for shipping and when you will pay for shipping?
No matter how blatant you are with this message, there is guaranteed to always be that one customer who will claim ignorance and do everything in their power to smudge your reputation. Review your charge-back policies very carefully.
3. Do you still use postage stamps?
This is probably one of the common ways to short change your business’s bottom line. The cents add up quickly when shipping increases as your business grows. A twenty-dollar monthly service charge to a postage meter company can easily be a worthwhile investment especially when your shipping numbers grow alongside your business.
Don’t fall victim to these common mistakes when shipping package returns.