Speaker 1: Free Amazon returns at Coal's what's the process? Like, Hey there,
Speaker 1: amrich Demiro. This is rich on Tech Daily. Did you
Speaker 1: know that you can return the items you buy at
Speaker 1: Amazon for free at select Coal stores. It's an unlikely partnership,
Speaker 1: but recently I tried out the process to see how
Speaker 1: it goes. First, some background. The two companies announced the
Speaker 1: partnership back in September twenty seventeen. It's offered in a
Speaker 1: select group of stores in Los Angeles and Chicago. You
Speaker 1: bring your stuff to Coals, they pack it up and
Speaker 1: then ship it back to Amazon for free. There are
Speaker 1: apparently even dedicated parking spots near the front door, although
Speaker 1: I did miss this when I return my stuff.
Speaker 2: So what does Coals.
Speaker 1: Get out of this? Well, more traffic and an Amazon's
Speaker 1: smart Home experience. In several stores, this is where they
Speaker 1: basically show off Amazon's smart home products like Alexa and
Speaker 1: all the stuff you can use with it. So it's
Speaker 1: sort of a two way street with mutual benefits for
Speaker 1: both companies. So what's the process of returning an Amazon
Speaker 1: item to Coles?
Speaker 2: Really? Like? Well, it's pretty easy. Here's how I tried it.
Speaker 1: I bought four phone cases for my phone, knowing I
Speaker 1: would only keep the one that I liked. So when
Speaker 1: I went to return the other three, Amazon wanted seven
Speaker 1: dollars for return shipping. Well, yeah, understandable because this was
Speaker 1: my fault. There was no issue with the product. I
Speaker 1: don't lie when I returned stuff to Amazon. I just
Speaker 1: tell them what the deal is, and I said, I
Speaker 1: just didn't need it anymore. So when you return something
Speaker 1: that's not defective, it'll tell you how much it will
Speaker 1: cost to return the item in various ways. So if
Speaker 1: it's your fault and you have really no issue with
Speaker 1: the product except you just don't want it anymore, sometimes
Speaker 1: they will charge you a couple of dollars to return
Speaker 1: it via the mail or.
Speaker 2: Something like that.
Speaker 1: If it's defective, sometimes Amazon will pay for shipping. But
Speaker 1: in this case, it was my fault and I just said, hey,
Speaker 1: I didn't need these anymore. And so my main option
Speaker 1: that was free was the coal's option. The other options
Speaker 1: were not available to me, like the Amazon locker. Mailing
Speaker 1: it back would have cost seven dollars. So I said,
Speaker 1: you know what, let me try this out. The only
Speaker 1: thing was I had to drive just a little further
Speaker 1: to find a Lowcay where this was offered at a
Speaker 1: coals near me. But when I got there, I was
Speaker 1: immediately greeted by an associate who noticed the Amazon packaging
Speaker 1: I had in my hand, and he directed me right
Speaker 1: to a special Amazon's return desk near the front door.
Speaker 1: I was pretty impressed. I thought I was gonna go
Speaker 1: to like a cashier or something, but it was a
Speaker 1: whole area set up just for this purpose. Then once
Speaker 1: I got there, another helpful associate with a smile, took
Speaker 1: the items from me. She scanned a QR code right
Speaker 1: off the screen on my phone. She printed out a
Speaker 1: receipt and I was off. The interesting thing was she
Speaker 1: didn't even look at the stuff that I had in
Speaker 1: the packaging. So you know, if you go to best
Speaker 1: Buy or whatever and you return to Electronic, they kind
Speaker 1: of take it all out, make sure all the parts
Speaker 1: are there, make sure all the pieces are there. I
Speaker 1: guess Amazon must do that on the back end when
Speaker 1: they receive your goods. So the receipt that I got
Speaker 1: had a twenty five percent off coupon off of one
Speaker 1: transaction good for seven days, and that was pretty much it.
Speaker 1: The transaction was done. Now, obviously they give you that
Speaker 1: little coupon so that you stay in the store and
Speaker 1: maybe a shop, maybe you buy something at Coal's. I
Speaker 1: did not do that. I just walked out of the store.
Speaker 1: But my receipt said that it would take up to
Speaker 1: twenty one days to process my refund. But I had
Speaker 1: an email from Amazon about three hours later in my
Speaker 1: inbox saying that my return was processed and a credit
Speaker 1: was issued to my visa for about forty five dollars.
Speaker 1: So I did not spend a thing to return these
Speaker 1: back to Amazon. The other neat thing about this process
Speaker 1: is that you don't have to pack your stuff up now.
Speaker 1: I brought it in an Amazon envelope that they sent
Speaker 1: to me, But you don't have to do that. All
Speaker 1: you have to do is bring the products in and
Speaker 1: Coals apparently we'll get them into Amazon in a nice fashion.
Speaker 1: The question is will this partnership expand will it last?
Speaker 1: As far as I can tell from the announcement date,
Speaker 1: it doesn't seem like they added any news stores to
Speaker 1: the ones that are already doing this. But who knows
Speaker 1: if this will last. Time will tell. But all I
Speaker 1: have to say is returning an item to Coles that
Speaker 1: you bought from Amazon is fast and easy, and it's
Speaker 1: kind of a nice alternative to packing things up and
Speaker 1: shipping them back. A lot of people don't have the
Speaker 1: tape around their house or the boxes they need. The
Speaker 1: Amazon lockers, I find are a pretty easy option too.
Speaker 1: Of course, Amazon just wants to make the purchase and
Speaker 1: returns process as easy as possible for all of their customers,
Speaker 1: because the more comfortable you are knowing you can return
Speaker 1: something easily, the more comfortable you are clicking that buy button.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much for listening. You can find a link
Speaker 1: if you want to watch my full video review of
Speaker 1: the returns process at cools from Amazon on my website.
Speaker 2: Just go to richon tech dot tv for the link.
Speaker 1: And if you like what I'm doing with this podcast,
Speaker 1: please leave a review in the Apple Podcasts app. All
Speaker 1: you have to do is search for my podcast and
Speaker 1: look for the part where it says write a review.
Speaker 2: I'm Rich Demiro. I'll talk to you real soon.