No matter how good your product or customer service is, a poor shipping policy is enough to drive anyone away. Too many businesses don’t spend enough time on their shipping policy, and it can affect the company in a significant way. Why?
Estimated reading time: 4 minutes
Firstly, you must ensure that your shipping prices and times can compete among the very best; you want to look professional and, therefore, should offer a competitive service. However, it would be best if you also had a little room to surprise the customer, this way you can’t lose. If it arrives on time, then it is what they expected. They will be more likely to return and recommend it to others if it comes earlier. So, what makes the perfect shipping policy?
Shipping Policy Wording
It is always better to over-deliver than to under-deliver. When you have ordered something online, you feel a lot happier about the service if it was delivered faster than expected. If you say delivery will take four days, the customer has bought your product expecting it to take that long. If it turns up sooner, they will feel great and pleasantly surprised. Late packages will lead to unhappy customers and, potentially, refunds.
For this reason, your customer has to know where they stand so they aren’t buying your product/service without knowing everything in advance, and your policy should reflect this.
Honesty
When buying a product, customers like to know every charge before entering the transaction. Nothing is worse than accepting a price only to find that a shipping charge will be added. Be upfront with your customers and make them aware of any shipping costs.
The whole world is well aware that one or two-day ‘extra-fast’ shipping will cost more than an average delivery, so they won’t mind as long as they are told at the beginning. Similarly, high-volume shipping will likely cost more, so your customers will need to be told early on as they are more than likely comparing your services to others on the market.
Shipping Policy Feedback
It is easy to be scared of feedback. Many think that none is better than bad, but it can be essential to help your business grow. Poor feedback will help you realize the areas that need improvement, and good feedback will motivate you to continue. Furthermore, you can gain loyalty if you recognize a problem and offer to replace a faulty product or even shipping discounts in the future. This may cost a little now, but it can do wonders for your reputation in the long run.
Ultimately, a shipping policy is a vital part of a business and needs to be considered carefully. Many top-quality products have fallen by the wayside simply because their shipping policy was poor, don’t let that be you!
How Refund Retriever Can Help You
Shipping is essential, so it’s only fitting that you have the best services in your hand. Refund Retriever will find the shipping refunds owed to you by UPS and FedEx, which saves you a lot of time and money. Since 2006, our in-house proprietary parcel invoice auditing software cuts your monthly costs. 5-10% of packages arrive late; even if it’s late by 60 seconds, you are entitled to a full refund!
We track and estimate all shipments, determine what’s late, contact FedEx and UPS for each refund request, and verify that the refund was applied. Are you getting the rate discount your volume deserves? You’ve negotiated with the carrier for specific discounts for each service. But how do you compare to other companies shipping at a similar volume?
You can see this easily with our small parcel rate discount benchmarking report! There are no setup, monthly, or cancellation fees…We don’t charge you unless we’re saving you money! If you struggle with shipping and need to recover costs, have Refund Retriever do it for you so you can get back to making money with your business. Save money and create the perfect shipping policy with our help.
