Many Brits will avoid shopping online if they can’t return items for free
Market research platform Appinio has conducted a survey with 1,000 British online shoppers to gauge their opinion on free returns.
This follows the news that Zara will stop its free policy and start charging its shoppers for returning items, joining other major retailers including Next, Uniqlo, and Sports Direct.
The research found that 71% of Brits are likely to avoid shopping online if they’re required to pay for the postage of their returns.
To avoid doing so, 67% would be willing to travel to a store to return their order in person, while 63% are likely to shop online less if return postage costs become more common.
Other key findings include:
Respondents that have a high annual income are the most likely to say they’ll avoid shopping online if they’re required to pay for the postage of their online orders (£75,000 - £100,000 at 87%; £100,000 and over at 84%).
94% of Brits say free returns are important to them when shopping online.
18% always shop at particular online stores because they have a free returns policy.
46% say free returns dictate their online store choices often.
Women are more likely than men to always shop at particular online stores because they have a free returns policy (21% vs. 15%)
55% of Brits say they’re concerned about the environmental impact their online returns may have, with 12% being ‘very concerned’
Men are more concerned about this than women (57% vs. 51%).
16-24-year-olds are the age group the most likely to say they’re concerned about this (61%).
31% of Brits believe that tackling ‘haul culture’ - where Instagram and TikTok users bulk buy items to show their followers - is the main reason that retailers are choosing to stop free returns.
17% of Brits say they tend to return over 50% of their online orders.
55-65-year-olds are the age group the most likely to return under 10% of their online orders at 67% (vs. 41% average).
45% of Brits buy items online more often today than they did before the Covid-19 pandemic.
43% of Brits buy more items online today than they did before the pandemic, as just 10% buy less items online compared to before the outbreak.
The full findings of the research can be found here.
