Providing a seamless return experience isn't just a service; it's a powerful competitive advantage. In this article, you'll discover why offering a return label in the box elevates your business operations and customer satisfaction and how to do it easily with ShippyPro.✨
Summary:
1. What is a Return Label in the box?
A return label in the box is a pre-printed label included inside a package along with the original items being shipped to a customer. The return label typically contains important information such as the recipient's address, the sender's address, a unique tracking number, and often a barcode or QR code for efficient processing. It is used by customers who need to initiate a return of the purchased items, allowing them to send the products back to the seller or retailer with ease.
Here the 4 key advantages of including a return label with every order:
Flexibility: fewer instructions to send every time you receive a return request while customers can do everything by themselves.
Boost credibility: companies that send the return label along with the product, like Zalando, gained great credibility because the customer knew they could trust them and in this way was more likely to buy from them again.
Differentiate from competitors: not every company can boast such a service and it can allow you to have a positive differentiation from many other services.
Increase conversion rate while reducing cart abandonment: when people find themselves deciding whether to buy from you or not, giving them an easy alternative to return their orders can truly reduce the chances of abandoning their cart.
2. Best practices to follow
We know how crucial it is to provide a return label in the box for fashion brands, 3PL, and retail businesses as a significant competitive advantage. Here are some tips on how to manage return labels in the box easily while saving time & budget:
💸 Use a more convenient Carrier service for returns
Save on shipping budget: Some Carriers apply surcharges for returns. Alternatively, you can choose to use the express service for delivery and the standard service for returns. All of this can be automated seamlessly through API integration.
🏓 Add a barcode with the order reference
A barcode or text in the return label with the order reference/ID is essential to avoid errors and to easily retrieve data when the return arrives in the warehouse (in cases of failed delivery or customer returns).
👁 Easily identify if it's a return at a glance
Indicate if it's a return label or not. This is helpful to quickly understand which label should be placed on the package and avoid errors during bulk printing.
📑 Add return instructions
You can print personalized return instructions right after the return label to include in the package, or your Marketplace may require such documents. Delight your customers and ensure they follow the procedure to send the package back or schedule a pickup.
3. How does it work?
Setting up a label in the box couldn't be easier. Once everything has been configured ShippyPro will automatically generate a return label from the same Carrier together with the outbound one, every time.
Flag the Print Return Label option from Carriers > Connection > Edit:
From Label Creator > To ship then click on Create Shipment for the order you'd like to ship and proceed with all the steps you'll be asked to complete
Finally, select the Carrier you'd like to employ:
From Label Creator > Shipping Labels, you’ll be able to display both your automatically created outbound and inbound labels by clicking on the purple icons.
This is an example of how your shipment and return label will look like:
And don’t forget to take a look here for all the Carriers that support it, the list gets constantly updated ✔️
4. FAQs
a. What if you need to print a return label with a different Carrier?
Easy peasy! With our Return Label Carrier Combination API, you'll be able to create the return label in the box as well as the shipping label using a different carrier with one single call for all your Carriers
Discover more here:
By following the steps above, the return label will be automatically printed every time you create a shipment, as easy as that! ✨