Aiming to curb unsustainable shopping habits, ASOS will now charge serial returners
ASOS just updated its return policy, targeting customers whose shopping style makes free returns unsustainable.
The UK-based online fashion retailer has revamped its previously implemented Fair Use Policy, now deducting GBP 3.95 per returned parcel from refunds for shoppers with a return rate of 70% or higher who've placed at least three orders in the past year. For the most prolific returners — those with an 80% return rate across five or more orders — ASOS charges an additional GBP 3.95 handling fee on top of standard delivery costs.
The policy includes a 30-day processing window and continuously monitors customer behavior over rolling 12-month periods, allowing shoppers to track their return rate through their account dashboard. ASOS is framing the policy as protecting free returns for the majority while addressing a minority of customers whose shopping patterns strain the business model. Customers can avoid the fees by keeping items worth more than GBP 40 per order, and ASOS still offers full free returns for faulty or incorrect items.
TREND BITE
ASOS's Fair Use Policy uses economic friction to reshape customer behavior without outright bans. Rather than penalizing all returns or eliminating the service entirely, the retailer creates a transparent, tiered system that preserves benefits for most while discouraging excessive returns through modest fees. The approach balances business sustainability with customer retention, banking on the reality that most shoppers will adjust their habits rather than absorb recurring costs.
It's also a tacit acknowledgment that the environmental cost of returns — the carbon emissions from transport, packaging waste and products that end up in landfill — has become too significant to ignore. As e-commerce matures and margins compress, expect more brands to deploy similar behavioral economics: not punishing customers, but making unsustainable habits just inconvenient enough to discourage them, for both financial and environmental reasons.
