Is Your Brand Providing A Satisfactory Post-Purchase Experience?

‘UK’s Top 100 Retailers’ Post-Purchase Secrets Report 2024,’ reveals key findings into retail post-purchase experiences.

Every customer has a go-to online shopping platform for their regular purchases, whether it’s one of the well-established retail giants, or local brands that they love for the personal care and attention they offer. What makes a retailer their preferred choice could be any of the following: great discounts, timely delivery, friendly UI, and more. But what could break this loyalty is how the retailer communicates with their customers post-purchase. 

There’s an alarming gap in retail returns policies and a shortfall in packaging practices, according to a new report. Post-purchase customer experience provider parcelLab and e-commerce customer care and fulfilment specialist Salesupply released ‘UK’s Top 100 Retailers’ Post-Purchase Secrets Report 2024,’ revealing key findings into retail post-purchase experiences.

The study showed that 40% of UK retailers fail to communicate with customers during the returns process and nearly 60% don’t use sustainable packaging, falling short of customer expectations. The report also highlighted that communication during the returns process is a key failure with the aforementioned 40% of retailers not keeping customers informed “leading to frustration and lost loyalty”.  

Nearly half of retailers take more than a week to process refunds, with an average refund time of eight days. Surprisingly, only 9% allow item exchanges through their returns portals, “missing a crucial chance to boost customer satisfaction and repeat business”. 

The report also found that nearly 20% of retailers always charge for delivery. Over 80% of retailers provide express delivery, averaging £6.93, with industries like health, cosmetics and jewellery imposing the lowest surcharges.

Customer service channels

UK’s top online stores offer their customers a variety of contact channels ranging from telephone to social media, email or contact form and chat. WhatsApp, one of the younger generation‘s preferred communication channels, is not yet widely used as a customer service channel. 

Long waiting times

More than a quarter of the top shops do not publish a customer service number. And six of the 100 retailers reviewed hid the customer service number as well as they could. 

Half of the retailers surveyed took over five minutes to answer phone calls, with the average being 8:23 minutes. Retailers also take some time to respond to customer enquiries on the other channels. Email enquiries to customer service were answered after an average of 12 minutes. On social media, testers waited an average of 10 minutes for a response and WhatsApp questions were answered after an average of 15 minutes. 

Use of customer technology

Two-thirds (66%) of online retailers now use chatbots to manage customer queries, reflecting an industry shift towards automation to enhance efficiency and manage customer interactions at scale. 

Customer service greatly impacts the post-purchase experience for customers, and there is room for improvement for UK retailers. Brands in the UK must consider the findings essential and enable call to action for providing customers with the apt satisfaction, giving them a chance to return as loyal customers.