Woman buys loads of clothes and returns almost every single one.

[notedbiscuits]

Just returned home from Asda. As well as buying a few groceries, I wanted to return an item of clothing which wasn’t suitable. At the customer service desk, there was a woman who was returning about 45 items of clothing in the sales.

She was still at the CSD when I finished the shopping. To pass the time, I went to the clothing and browsed just in case I found something to exchange for. Nope.

So I saw the woman leaving and took my chance and went to the customer service desk. The assistant was fed up with the woman as she does this every time Asda do a massive clothes sale. The woman picks up for example every single girls dress in the available sizes in the sale and return at least 95% of the items. She and her colleagues want her banned as she creates so much work for very little sales.

Not sure if the woman has a MH issue or what.

Most people including myself buy two different sizes of the same clothes and return one of the sizes.

They should just ban her from the store. They arent obliged to sell her anything.

People like that they should refuse to sell to them. Some sort of shopping addiction or weird thing, causes so much hassle for the shop and fellow customers like you who have to wait around

It does happen at online stores but if you can see and even try on at the store ... It is odd

That sounds like a hassle for the staff but if you’re consistently buying two sizes and returning one (so 50% of stuff) aren’t you basically doing the same thing?

There were a few elderly people who were banned from our local department store for that reason. Well, they were still allowed in, but they weren’t allowed to buy anything.

They liked to go in (individually), chat to the sales assistants and buy something they didn’t need. A day or two later, they’d always return for another chat and a refund. It was quite sad really.

I’m not returning 45 items and buying all available girls dresses from age 3-12 then returning them all

Never mind the annoyance for staff its also straight up immoral for other shoppers.

About a third of clothes sales are returned.

Well if Asda and other supermarkets brought back the changing rooms they removed during Covid there wouldn’t be a need. Any shop selling clothes should have a changing room, if they don’t expect loads of returns .

They don't have to refund sale items unless they are faulty, not as described or don't do what they are supposed to do. There is no obligation to refund an item because a customer has changed their mind.

Many people will buy an item in two different sizes because there is no guarantee which size will fit properly and return the one that doesn't, stores stopping that would lose customers very quickly but the level of this shopper could easily be refused, especially on sales.

I’d guess she lists them on eBay/vinted in the hope that they’ll be hot in demand and she can make a few quid on them, then returns anything that doesn’t sell before the returns period ends.

Stores should get tough with the few people like that, and store managers should back them up 100%.

I wonder if retailing laws could help here.

I think a lot of people do this in the sales. The Next sale was always insane. People would just scoop up armfuls of stuff and buy everything. Then for the few weeks after the sale there would always be queues of people waiting to return piles of stuff.

Something about a big discount makes some people lose their minds. My husbands family can't miss a big discount. So they buy stuff they don't want and try and find someone to pass it of to (me usually it seems!). My favorite was a Tu swimming costume for 8-10 year old when my daughter was 2! Thaaaaaanks

If stores want people to stop doing that then they either need to bring back changing rooms or make their sizes consistent.

Not sure if the woman has a MH issue or what

If you genuinely think she might have a MH issue then it's pretty cruel to come and post about her on the internet

That was my thoughts too.

If it annoys the store they should put a policy in place.

At the Next sale people take all items in a particular age category, especially baby clothing. So all boys 18 to 24 months for example. Then they go through it at their leisure and return the things they don't like the next day. These people don't care about the waste of staff time, bearing in mind they have just gone to a 4am sale where someone had to stay up all night to serve them.

Maybe she has a big family, like 21 kids and so wants to dress all the girls in the same dress?

She will be reselling online trying to make profit then returning what doesn't sell in the 28 day period

Our Asda and Tesco have some lovely clothes but no changing rooms anymore. It puts me off buying as I know 80%of items i try on i dont suit so not worth the hassle. Doesn't explain 45 items but I do expect shops without changing rooms to have more returns.

I was once at a Boden factory sale and a couple of professional EBay sellers went in first, put a huge amount of clothes in two huge baskets and then sat down sifting through what they wanted and what they didn't.
This took several hours and in the meantime the clothes were not available for anyone else to purchase.

This is on the company to sort out. They might not care in the big scheme of things or they could ban her.

I once worked for a high end, high street brand and while not on commission, we were kept to tight sales targets. We were expected to turn refunds around into exchanges wherever possible.

I had 1 customer who would spend hours trying everything on, need lots of assistance, spend up to about £1000 but always, always bring it all back, right on the last day possible for a refund.

I very politely spoke to her once and suggested we find a alternative styles to usual, pointing out everything always comes back so clearly we aren't doing our jobs properly as style advisors. She seemed really shocked, like she thought we wouldn't have noticed her recurring habits. Think it's more likely Asda lady is flogging online but my lady had clear issues and it was quite sad, if infuriating for us.
(She actually stopped shopping with us after my chat, was such a relief!)

I was once in an ex-catalogue shop, so imagine a huge TK Maxx style clothes shop and as soon as I walked in I was hit by this rancid smell, so I asked the assistant what it was and she pointed at 2 women wandering around, she said they were regulars and the staff had to follow them and bin anything they touched.

I used to work in a jewellery shop and you'd see this a lot. I waived the return period for a bloke once who'd literally shed thousands a few weeks before. He looked terrible and I barely recognised him. He explained to me that he had bipolar disorder, bought it all when he was manic and came crashing down and hadn't left his flat for days. It was heartbreaking.

There ought to be more awareness about this in retail. Betting shops are getting better as are some cornershops as people with addictions can ask that they aren't served. Many people would probably disagree and feel as though placing that responsibility on a merchant is inappropriate but on a human level, there's likely more that can be done to protect people with blatant issues out and about in the community.

The woman is y doing anything wrong if the store allows it.

She may be buying to sell on or she may have mental health problems.

It's very poor of the staff to discuss a customer with another customer.