“Don’t open that gift!!”

CNN Money has an article that came as a surprise to me. I had always thought that I could return pretty much anything that I got as a gift that I didn’t like. No so anymore:

“Quick & easy gift returns? Not this year”

Retailers are getting choosier about what they accept for returns, even with receipt and sometimes even unopened. You could get hit with a restocking fee, or not be able to return the item if it’s not exactly as you bought it. These measured tightenings of return policy combat the losses that the retaliers suffer because of returns of stolen items and returns of used items — ones that the “buyer” never really intended on keeping.

Another surprise? Wal-Mart is still pretty no-questions-asked with their returns, which gains points in my book. They do, however, use software to flag habitual returners to discourage them from abusing the return policy.

The lesson to learn from this: Make sure that you know what the return policy of the store is when you buy a gift for someone, and make sure that they evaluate whether they will keep the item or not before opening it up, if that’s the policy of the store. And also tell them to return it, pronto, if they don’t like it — there may be a deadline.