What our e-commerce cheating says about virus fatigue
As we move into what was once the traditional start of the holiday shopping season, it’s worth taking a moment to consider how COVID-19 has changed the world.
Shopping seems a strange lens through which to view our pandemic-weary state. But I spend a lot of my day thinking about shopping and who shops and how they shop and why they shop. I also think about who cheats when they shop, particularly online.
It turns out, that’s a lot of people. And I blame COVID. In fact, I fear the pandemic is breaking us. Just hear me out.
First, the cheating. The company I work for recently commissioned an internet poll of 1,500 U.S. consumers. A shockingly large portion of them admitted to lying and cheating in order to get products they ordered online for free or at a reduced price. Specifically:
• 40% said they told their credit card companies that a legitimate charge on their account was a fraudulent charge in order to keep a product and get a refund.
• 33% said they falsely claimed that an online order never arrived, even though it did, or that they claimed an item was not satisfactory, even though it was, in order to get a refund. (Retailers sometimes allow customers to keep unsatisfactory items rather than incur the expense of handling a return.)
• 31% said they had broken discount rules by, for instance, using a “one-time- only” discount more than once.
We don’t have deep historical data with which to compare, but in January, we asked consumers if they had ever falsely claimed that an item had not been delivered. In those pre-pandemic days, only 8% said they had. It’s a slightly different question from what we asked in September, but it touches on a very similar moral decision.
So, what’s going on? I had my theories, but I turned to Meir Statman, a finance professor and behavioral economist at Santa Clara University. Statman, for his part, turned to Dan
Ariely, author of “The Honest Truth About Dishonesty: How We Lie to Everyone — Especially Ourselves.”
“The point that he makes, that I think is really very profound, is people are willing to cheat in small ways, but not in large ways,” Statman told me. Especially, he added, if they can weave a story that makes it all a misunderstanding should they get caught.
That package that never arrived? Turns out, my well-meaning neighbor brought it into her house, so it wouldn’t get stolen. Silly me.
But why the apparent increase in this bad shopping behavior? COVID and commerce cause a disharmonic convergence that is ideal for fostering bad behavior. First, many have lost their jobs or some of their income. Some are desperate. Second, people are stressed. Eight months of being told what we can and cannot do wears on one.
Third, life is not fair. We didn’t ask for COVID. COVID is being done to us. Why don’t we pay the misery forward to retailers? And fourth, e- commerce eliminates interpersonal connections. You don’t buy products from a store associate. There is no one to look in the eye, no one’s smile to acknowledge and return. Who’s really getting hurt here?
The answer of course is ourselves. By cheating we become lesser. Our kindergarten teacher could have told us that. Hopefully, this bad behavior will trend back down toward 8% once we tackle the coronavirus. If we don’t, I fear a piece of our moral fiber is just one more thing it will have taken from us.
I spend a lot of my day thinking about shopping and who shops and how they shop and why they shop. I also think about who cheats when they shop, particularly online.