The Weird Psychology Of Returning Stuff To The Store

To shoppers, the appeal of lax return policies like these appear obvious. Buy what you want now, while you’re already in the store or on its website, and make your final decision later, after you’ve had a chance to take it home and think on it. To retailers, on the other hand, it would seem that lenient return policies are not such a good business practice, and many in the last decade or so have added restrictions to once-lax policies. Costco, for instance, once used the same indefinite deadline, but in 2012 switched to a 90-day deadline; Sears went from allowing returns within a “reasonable period of time” to a 30- to 90-day return policy, depending on the item purchased. Read more at New York Magazine.