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Marketplace All-in-One

Rise of the return fee

Marketplace All-in-One

Marketplace

Business, News

4.51.4K Ratings

🗓️ 26 December 2025

⏱️ 7 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Now that Christmas presents are unwrapped, many of you — you know who you are — will head to stores to return gifts and get what you actually want. But increasingly, retailers are charging for those returns. Then, a couple of months ago, more than 5 million shoppers embraced a boycott of three major retailers: Amazon, Home Depot, and Target. From "This Is Uncomfortable," we'll learn about the impact it had on shoppers.

Transcript

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0:00.0

My place in tech changes every day, but I don't fear the future, because I'm with the leader, Pluralsight.

0:08.7

Their online learning platform has the hands-on expert-led courses I need to master new tech skills and create bigger impacts.

0:17.3

So I can learn quickly and stay ahead.

0:21.0

With Pluralsight, I don't fear what's next.

0:24.0

I embrace it.

0:25.6

Tap in at Pluralsight.com and see for yourself.

0:31.1

If you're heading out to return some Christmas gifts, stay tuned.

0:35.8

From Marketplace, I'm Novoso and for David Brancaccio.

0:39.0

Now that Christmas presents are unwrapped, many of you, and you know who you are,

0:43.5

are going to be heading to stores to return gifts and get what you actually want.

0:47.9

But increasingly, retailers are charging for those returns.

0:52.1

According to the National Retail Federation, 72% will do so this

0:55.8

holiday. Marketplaces Henry Up explains why. With online shopping, we've gotten pretty used to the

1:00.8

idea that you can return stuff for free. And because of that, a lot of shoppers do this thing called

1:05.4

bracketing, says Edgar Dwarski, founder of consumerworld.org. They will get, let's say, pants, three different sizes and colors of pants, not knowing which

1:17.0

one they're going to want to keep.

1:19.0

They'll keep one item and return the other two.

1:21.2

Nice for the customer, but for the retailer, those returns add up.

1:25.1

The postage costs a lot of money, the processing of those returns cost

1:29.9

money. So you begin to see some companies saying enough. And they're slapping a fee on returns,

1:37.9

especially returns by mail, Dorski says. The risk for companies is that customers don't like

1:43.6

being charged fees, says David Sobey,

...

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