Santa doesn’t always get it right and now that the festivities are over and consumers have had a chance to recover from the holidays, they’ll be returning those gifts that weren’t quite right. How your business deals with the increased volume of returns will absolutely impact how customers view your business and could determine whether or not they come back, so take the time to have a plan to serve customers and make the process easy.

Here are a few tips for you to make it through the holiday return season and build positive relationships at the same time.

• Return policies should be clearly posted at the cash register.
• Make sure that all employees are trained to handle returns in order to reduce wait times.
• Give your employees the power to make exceptions to the policy without having to get approval from a manager.
• Have a system in place to document returns that do not follow policy (for example, if a receipt is not available or the time period for a return has passed).
• Make sure your POS is updated with the tools to track returns so that you can run reports later.
• Keep it simple. One basic question about the reason for a return should be enough information for your employee to continue. Asking too many questions puts the customer on the defense.
• If you have a high return volume, switch out your staff periodically in order to give them a break, dealing with returns can be stressful.

Attaining a new customer costs your business five times more than keeping a current one. With that in mind, if a customer is frustrated or rude, it is your staff’s job to make the experience as seamless and pleasant as possible, and it is your job to give your employees the tools to do so.

Marketing 360 Payments offers integrated products that work with your point of sale system to help you manage inventory and make returns easy to track. Contact us today to learn more about how we are making business richer!