I want to know if other members also have such experience.
I used to work at an Amazon return’s facility as a trainer and manager.
Before I talk about the return process, there is a little knowledge you need to know about how Amazon works with vendors.
Vendors have a choice as to how something gets returned. They can choose to have Amazon:
- Ship back all of their returns to them
- Throw their returns away
- Assess the damage, if any, and sell them as used.
- ‘Liquidate’ them (essentially sell them as damaged)
- Or, if it meets Amazon’s standard, they can sell a returned item as new. For example, if it the item hasn’t been open and the box is in good condition, it can be sold as new.
When an item goes through a returns, the Amazon employee has a questionnaire they need to fill out about the item. It will ask about item damage, if it looks like it was opened, is it missing parts, does it have security closures, etc. Depending on the vendors desire and how the questions are answered, the system will tell them to send the item wherever it needs to go. Every single item that goes through the return process will receive an LPN sticker, no matter what happens to it, even if the questionnaire calls the item ‘new’.
If it gets sent back to a vendor, it will get a sticker with a light-green outline. If it is sold as an Amazon Warehouse Deal it should get a sticker that says that. These items are supposed to be considered ‘used’.
What some shady vendors will do is buy Amazon deals and resell them as new. Other vendors within take returns that were returned to them and resell them as new as well. I assume that the former happened to you.
Some vendors will list the item as new in the listing(where Amazon doesn’t see it as used), but put something like ‘renewed’ or ‘refurbished’ in the title/description. This may have happened as well.
