Consumers Are Tasking AI To Help With Returns

Consumers are putting artificial-intelligence tools to work when making return claims for items they’ve purchased. Fifty percent are using services such as ChatGPT and Claude to help draft return or refund claims, finds the “Rewriting Rules on Return” report released by Riskified, a fraud-prevention services provider.

That results in many shoppers creating what Riskified calls “highly convincing return requests, which [are] overwhelming retailers.”

“Between 32% and 49% [of consumers] across markets already prefer AI for starting a return or exchange. If today’s adoption rate for AI-drafted return claims is 50%, it is only a matter of time before this becomes a majority practice among consumers,” Riskified says in the report.

Adding to the change is that 46% of consumers think it’s OK to return something because it looks different in person than it did online and that 42% participate in “bracketing,” which is buying multiple sizes or colors to try on at home, only to return the ones they don’t like. Some retailers, like online shoe retailer Zappos, are seemingly OK with this by offering free returns.

Consumers, however, may be more prone to engaging in return policy abuse. The Riskified report, which was conducted by eTail Insights, found that 85% of consumers see some form of strategic or deceptive return practices as normal behavior. That’s higher than in 2024 when another Riskified report found that 51% openly admitted to bracketing.

“Online shopping has become a multiple-times-per-week habit for most consumers, which means even marginal shifts in return behavior ripple through operations at scale. The real question is no longer how often people return, but what they believe they are entitled to do, and how far apart that belief is from what merchants can sustain,” Riskified says.

Though seemingly lax return policies may be welcomed by consumers, most—52%—support stricter return policies. Why? Riskified says many wanted to be treated with honesty and they don’t want to have negative buying experiences because of someone else’s behavior.

Merchants are not idle in their responses to this shift. “Several described narrowing acceptable return reasons from over ten categories to five, shortening return windows, and requiring that returned items be completely unopened and unused,” Riskified says. “One e-commerce marketplace leader offered a more nuanced view. They believe that bracketing is less a form of abuse and more a byproduct of the inherent limitations of online clothing shopping. Most retailers have already built this fact into their margins, but the increasing scale of this behavior threatens to make margins tighter.”

Indeed, 56% of consumers prefer personalized or tiered return policy approaches over a one-size-fits-all method.

ETail Insights surveyed 2,091 consumers in seven countries with 51% in the United States.