Sick and Tired of Etsy Automatic Refunds
It is theft. I ship greeting cards and stickers, at letter rate since tracked mail starts at more than the product costs. Buyers are given an option for priority mail, which of course they don’t take since, again, it costs more than the card. All shipping policies are clearly stated in multiple places during shopping and checkout, which naturally people do not read.
Then Etsy provides them with utterly false expectations by providing a fake delivery date that is based on nothing. Half of my customer service is responding to outraged complaints stemming from this specious delivery date nonsense.
The other half comes about since Etsy sees fit to offer exactly two options when someone contacts a seller, Replace and Refund. Neither of which are options I offer or approve, as even basic return mail means total shipping for that customer is 50% of the item cost at that point. Literally all of this is laid out in my shop policies, my item listings, AND my order confirmation email.
Of course people don’t read, and clearly Etsy could care less what the shop policy is, they’ll do as they please. So every single holiday the other half of my customer service emails consist of explaining this yet again, and then having Etsy preemptively issue refunds for products the customer failed to order in time, which are still on the way and going to arrive, thus just giving a free product to that person and causing me to be pay them for their own stupidity with free product. The refunds are issued without even giving the seller a chance to answer or offer a mutually satisfactory solution, the customer might as well just be scamming the sellers once they realize there isn’t tracking since its first class mail.
This costs me significant money every holiday, since people can’t be bothered to read, and Etsy feels entitled to do whatever they see fit with my products and revenue.
Sick of it, but it doesn’t matter as it will never change. Thanks, that’s my vent.