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Costco Accepts Returns from Expired Members
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Esther recently commented about how a lawnmower her mom purchased two years ago stopped working, a day out of warranty. On James’ urging, she took the lawnmower back and Costco gave her a full refund. That, however, is not the interesting part of the story because Costco’s liberal return policy is a well known and often debated fact, the interesting part is that her mom’s membership had lapsed/expired and they still accepted the return, no questions asked! That’s amazing!
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That’s a surprisingly customer friendly policy. I remember when I was a kid my mom used to have to argue for a long time to get something returned. I’m glad to see how things have changed. I’m a Costco member and I’ve been happy with their service too.
When I was a kid (many many years ago) stores truly CARED about their patrons. If people returned something it was because it faulty or wasn’t what was expected. No one returned something after years and out of warranty. That was when everyone had some sense of “doing the right thing” . Times have perhaps changed. That return policy of Costco’s was set up for members to operate on an honor system (remember honor?). It’s a courtesy extended to members (most of which probably wouldn’t do this). As a business owner do you think Costco should eat the cost of the lawnmower? I don’t understand the logic (much less financially prosperous nature) of resorting to this type of behavior as something that can be justified. Gosh, I hope I don’t have to pay the ultimate price (change in return policies) because of this type of conduct. Thanks for letting me share my perspective here.
Excellent comments Ziggy and I could not agree with you more! Wish more people were like you.
By the way, Jim Wang is incorrect in his above assertion that Costco’s policy is to accept returns from former (membership expired) members. They do not. Is it possible for some returns clerk somewhere to make a mistake and process a return such as this? Or for a manager to be bullied into taking an item back in order to preserve Costco’s stellar reputation? Yes, but it is definitely not “policy,” and it is not the norm.
Ha! Not at my location! Not a member, not returning anything! The sign states that they will refund a “members” money if they aren’t completely satisfied.
Costco will accept returns on items in a “reasonable amount of time”. That doesn’t mean that you return your vaccum cleaner that you bought 5 years ago because all of a sudden it died through use. It’s a different story if you returned it within 3 months because you didn’t like it. Don’t ABUSE the policy for those of us who shop at COSTCO.