E-commerce growth is making returns operations a bigger buying issue

Retailers still want growth.

That is obvious.

What is becoming more interesting is where the margin pressure is hiding while they chase it.

For many e-commerce operators, it is sitting in returns operations.

What the market data says

NRF's 2025 Retail Returns Landscape estimates that consumers will return $849.9 billion in merchandise in 2025 and that 19.3% of online sales will be returned.

The same data shows why this is not a simple customer-service issue:

• 82% of consumers say free returns matter when they shop online
• 76% are more likely to choose a return option that provides an instant refund or exchange
• 71% are less likely to shop with a retailer again after a poor returns experience
• 9% of all returns are considered fraudulent

Retailers are responding accordingly. Nearly 64% said updating their returns process in the next six months is a priority.

Deloitte's 2026 global retail outlook adds the broader market context:

• rising expectations for convenience, value, and personalization are colliding with persistent cost pressure and operational complexity
• 68% of surveyed retail executives expect agentic AI adoption in the next 12 to 24 months
• 95% expect global trade policies to push costs higher

That is the setup.

Online growth still matters. But the cost of handling the work after the sale is becoming harder to ignore.

Why returns are really an operations problem

Many teams still treat returns as a policy or CX discussion:

• free or paid
• store credit or refund
• exchange-first or refund-first

Those choices matter.

But the bigger challenge is operational:

• intake and labeling
• return reason normalization
• fraud review
• resale vs. restock vs. liquidation decisions
• inventory updates
• refund timing
• customer follow-up

That work usually spans multiple systems and more manual judgment than leaders expect.

If those handoffs are slow, the business loses in several ways at once:

• higher support volume
• slower inventory recovery
• weaker customer trust
• more fraud exposure
• more labor inside reverse logistics

Why this is becoming more urgent in 2026

Deloitte says four in 10 Americans now behave as deal-driven or cost-conscious shoppers.

That makes reverse logistics more important, not less.

When customers care more about value, their expectations around refunds, exchanges, and post-purchase experience get sharper. At the same time, retailers are trying to defend margins under cost pressure.

That means returns can no longer sit off to the side as a cost center nobody redesigns.

They are part of the buying experience.

What stronger automation looks like

The right target is not "AI for shopping."

It is better post-purchase workflow execution:

• classify return reasons consistently
• flag fraud risk before a refund is issued
• trigger the right route based on SKU, condition, or customer history
• sync carrier, warehouse, and commerce-system status
• decide resale, restock, or exception handling faster
• keep customers informed without creating extra ticket volume

These are exactly the kinds of workflows where automation matters:

• repetitive steps
• multiple systems
• real economic consequences
• high volume
• a clear definition of done

That is why returns operations increasingly looks like an AI and workflow-buying problem, not just a returns-policy problem.

What retailers should do now

Do not ask only whether your returns experience feels consumer-friendly.

Ask:

• How much manual labor sits behind each return?
• How quickly does inventory become usable again?
• How often do fraud checks create rework?
• How many customer contacts happen because internal systems are out of sync?
• Where does the workflow still depend on a person acting as middleware?

Those questions reveal the real margin leak.

The practical takeaway

Retail and e-commerce leaders still need to grow online revenue.

But the operators who protect more of that revenue will usually be the ones that redesign what happens after checkout:

• returns
• exchanges
• fraud review
• reverse logistics
• refund communication

That is where post-purchase complexity is turning into a buying issue.

And in 2026, it is becoming much harder to ignore.

Sources

• NRF, "Consumers Expected to Return Nearly $850 Billion in Merchandise in 2025"
• Deloitte, "2026 Global Retail Industry Outlook"

If your e-commerce team is growing but reverse logistics is still manual, our e-commerce page shows the kind of workflow work we target first. If you want a fast ROI view, run the calculator.