The impact of COVID-19 on managing product returns in retail

The Covid-19 pandemic has affected customers' shopping and returns behaviour and significantly aggravated the problem of high product returns rates and returns fraud. Measures for public health and safety resulted in retailers modifying their returns processes. The effects of these changes on returns management are unclear; very little is known about what retailers have experienced in terms of product returns during the pandemic. This paper addresses this research gap via a series of semi-structured interviews and a consumer survey. Our findings include a list of recommendations for retailers to mitigate the effects of the pandemic on returns and related fraud.