What is a fair return policy for a web retailer? That's the question raised by a recent reader's experience with a website that wouldn't budge off the policy detailed in its fine print.
"Three weeks ago I purchased for a client a computer and some associated peripherals, including a KVM from KVMs.com," a reader wrote. "As it took a while for the computer to come, I did not put everything together until two days ago. The KVM had come as soon as I ordered it, but when I tried it yesterday, it did not work correctly. Today I called KVMs.com to return the unit and they told me that it was too bad for me. They have a 14-day return policy on all their products -- unhappy or broken, they warranty the product for only 14 days."
The company would not show any flexibility in its policy. "As I had my KVM for 21 days, I was just out of luck," the reader wrote. "I asked to talk to a manager and it happened to be that I was talking to one of the owners. I tried to explain my case and told him that it was insane to have such a strict 14-day return policy. He did not listen and even got mad when I told him that I would tell people about their policy. I guess he thought that it is acceptable that their product did not work and that I lost money, and I should just be happy to have done business with them. So I want to make sure that as many people as possible know about this place."
A check of KVMs.com's return policy page shows the website does spell out the 14-day replacement for "opened defective policy" pretty clearly. Well, actually it says that within 14 calendar days of the original shipping date they will send "a replacement of the same defective product" -- which might be all too true of all too many web retailers. But the policy is there for anyone who wants to look through all the fine print ahead of time.
And it's certainly true that all retailers have to set some sort of time limit as to when they'll accept a return, or else every product might come back eventually. Still, the reader has a point that such a strict interpretation of a 14-day limit will in practice work out to be close to allowing no returns at all. If all you're talking about is a swap for what is hopefully an identical but non-defective unit, it hardly seems unreasonable to expect you would be entitled to that in the first three weeks.
But what do you think would be a fair policy is such a situation? Post your comments on my website or write me at Foster@gripe2ed.com.
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