Amazon’s many unhappy returns

IT has become common for Chinese sellers to mislead consumers on platforms such as Amazon.

Last year I revealed some of the sellers use trading names to make it appear they are from the UK.

It appears these unscrupulous Chinese traders have now gone one step further.

Last week Tess West told me of a disturbing problem which Amazon appears to be ignoring.

WHAT HAPPENED

In November Tess began receiving parcels for a Lucy Bullen at her home address.

She thought as it was coming up to Christmas someone had used her address in error.

But the parcels kept coming and were now being sent by various other people. Tess decided to open some of the packages to see where they had come from and discovered they were orders from Amazon being returned.

She phoned Amazon in January to tell them. During the call, the Amazon rep told her a Chinese seller was using her address as its returns address.

WHAT DID AMAZON DO?

Nothing, apart from give Tess a £50 credit which did absolutely nothing to stop the parcels as they kept on arriving at her house on a daily basis. Tess made numerous calls to Amazon over a six-month period in a quest to solve the issue but to no avail.

WIDER PROBLEM

So it has now been more than six months since Tess reached out to Amazon for help and the problem still has not been resolved. And it appears she is not alone.

I have also heard from other consumers whose home addresses are being used by Chinese sellers as their “returns address”.

WHAT DO AMAZON SAY?

I contacted Amazon and asked for comment. I also put it to Amazon that the appropriate step to take must be to suspend the seller’s Amazon account until it deals with the matter. Amazon responded as follows: “At Amazon we’re always looking to improve the customer and seller experience. When a new seller registers for an account we use industry-leading tools and expert investigators to verify their details.

“However, in this case, the seller incorrectly listed someone’s home address for deliveries and returns.

“We’ve taken action to address this issue, will contact the customer directly and apologise for any inconvenience caused.”