Dive Brief:
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As of April 20, Bed Bath & Beyond will no longer offer full refunds for returns without a receipt; the retailer will deduct 20% from the purchase total.
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Previously, customers were able to get a full refund without a receipt for store credit or an exchange.
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As with all retailers with generous return policies, the Union, New Jersey home goods company has seen its policy abused by many customers.
Dive Insight:
Bed Bath & Beyond has been that retailer with a couple of super customer-friendly policies: Its coupons never go out of date (despite any printed expiration date) and it takes returns without a receipt. That’s changing now; the retailer can’t afford its generosity on returns, thanks to a few bad apples who too often have brought in “outrageous returns” as the company told Racked magazine.
"We are expanding nationwide a modification to our return policy that will only affect customers whose purchase cannot be located to process a return, either because the receipt was not provided or because we could not identify the purchase through a query of our transaction records," the company told Racked in an email. "We have been providing advance notice of the upcoming change to our customers via signs and handouts in our stores, encouraging customers to hold onto their receipts to avoid being impacted by this change in any manner.”
The retailer, longtime customers will be relieved to know, still takes those aging coupons without issue.
