Need advice about customer who wants to return content 2-3 year after purchase!!!

[Toby]

Originally Posted by gonzo

There is no appeciation in business.
Id turn it into a sale if it were me.

OK, bear with me for a moment and I'll relate a story from my retail management days that ties into that very well.

I was a store manager for most of the 15 years I was in retail shoe sales, with a sales staff that was paid on commission. As store manager I got a commission on the overall store sales, plus a smaller commission on my own sales. For that reason I usually only waited on customers when everyone else was already busy.

The one exception was when a customer came in with a worn return, complaint, etc. I usually got called out of the back room to handle it. One particular Saturday morning, with two salesmen on the floor, the first several customers were returns. In each case I made the exchange, usually with a prorated credit for the wear, plus sold them at least one other pair and accessories.

Early afternoon they took a tally on what each of us had sold that day. By just handling returns I'd made more sales than the two of them combined. I didn't get called out of the back room to handle returns any more.

Moral of the story: Returns are an opportunity to turn an unhappy customer back into a happy customer and sell him something else.