Asos bans shoppers for ‘too many returns’

Online fashion retailer Asos has shut down some customers’ accounts and banned them for returning too many orders.

The company said a small number of people’s ‘shopping activity’ had breached its fair use policy. ‘This helps us maintain our commitment to offering free returns to all customers across all core markets,’ Asos told the BBC.

Self-confessed shopaholic Lucy Britnell is one of those who has been banned. She had paid for Asos’s premium account since 2018 to get free delivery. Ms Britnell told the BBC she spends at least £100 a month at Asos, with her last ‘holiday shop’ costing £500.

‘Most of the time I have to order two sizes and then I’ll return the one that doesn’t fit – and Asos sizing, especially its own brands, is very unpredictable,’ she said.

Another shopper, Louise Gowrie, 27, from Glasgow, had tried to appeal her ban but was told on live chat that the ‘decision was final’. Asos last year began charging a £3.95 fee if customers made too many returns and kept less than £40 of their order.

Some were irked at the time by the change and said they had no choice but to return garments as the brand’s sizes were so unreliable.

PR director Frankie Allen, 32, said she was recently banned and tried to explain to customer services on the company’s live chat system that she orders clothes in two sizes and returns the one that doesn’t fit.

Such ‘robotic comms’ have changed the way people view Asos and ‘alienated a lot of loyal customers’, Ms Allen told the BBC.

Asos said it shipped 67.2 million orders worldwide in the last financial year.

Fellow fashion retailer Pretty Little Thing faced a backlash for deactivating accounts it said had high return rates last year. The measure was introduced shortly after it brought in a £1.99 fee for returns.

Online shoppers tend to order the same product in an array of different sizes and colours.

Three in four returned items of clothing are dumped in landfill or burnt due to processing fees, according to data firm Statista