Abuse of Return Policy

Most stores allow customers to return items they have purchased for a refund within a set amount of time — as long as the item is (or appears to be) in its original, unused condition. This provides customers a form of recourse in the event they realize they don't need or want the item they bought after all.

Clever characters will realize they can take advantage of this policy to borrow things from the store for free by returning the item once they are finished using it. This is frequently done with clothes — usually a very expensive outfit that the character only needs to wear for a single special occasion.

In the clothing scenario, the character is usually a teenager, as they tend to be more likely to have difficulty affording expensive clothing. They are also more likely to feel the need to show off with an extravagant outfit at a birthday party, graduation, or similar event. If an adult does it, expect them to be The Scrooge or a Mock Millionaire.

This requires the item to be maintained in its original unused appearance and condition with the tags attached, which should be no sweat. After all, it can't be that hard to go one night without ruining your clothes. What kind of calamities could possibly happen at a party that would damage an outfit beyond repair?

Thanks to Rule of Funny, the item will be destroyed and rendered completely unreturnable, leaving the character on the hook for the extravagant cost. Or they might lose the receipt. The character might try to invoke Loophole Abuse in an attempt to convince the store to take the item back anyway with varying degrees of success.

Often a stunt pulled by the Unsatisfiable Customer, sometimes in an effort to resolve a Credit Card Plot. If the character never intended to return the clothes but they get destroyed anyway, see Doomed New Clothes.

This type of Real Life misbehaviour has resulted in many retailers charging a restocking fee on returned items, especially retailers of high-value goods which tend to be a target for this trope. Some stores have a "no returns" policy on wedding and seasonal goods to prevent this.

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Examples

Comic Books

• Maus: During the present, Vladek attempts to return a half-eaten, nearly empty, box of cereal to the grocery store. He succeeds after using his backstory as a Holocaust survivor to elicit pity from the store manager (and actually manages to get more than the value of the cereal back), but his son realizes they can never return to that store ever again in shame.

Comic Strips

• In one Dilbert comic Dilbert's mother tries returning a scarf for an arbitrary reason, only to find out she's been flagged in the store's database as a bad customer for too many returns, including that same scarf seven times. As such, the cashier was allowed to harvest her organs.

Films - Live Action

• Garden State: The local hardware store doesn't require receipts on returns under fifty dollars, so Mark will grab a fifty dollar item from the back of the store, take it to the counter, and get fifty bucks for it. He can only do it once with each employee, but no one stays there for long, so he has plenty of opportunities.
• Ocean's 8: Debbie Ocean's Establishing Character Moment has her selecting various expensive cosmetics from a fancy department store, then going up to a clerk and saying she wants to return them. When the saleslady asks to see her receipt, Debbie becomes huffy and claims that she shouldn't need one since the items are unopened; when the woman insists, Debbie angrily declares that she'll just keep them instead. A Jump Cut shows her striding down the street carrying five shopping bags from different stores, suggesting that she's pulled the con in every boutique she passed.

Game Shows

• Jeopardy!: In the 2016 College Championship, contestant Sam Deutsch tells Alex during the interview that he kept the tags on his school sweater, so he can return it in the event he doesn't win the tournament.

Literature

• The Fifth Horseman: A Sleepy Hollow Legend (by Gregg Gonzalez): Patrick Higgins is a dedicated user of this as a way of living beyond his means, which he calls the "thirty-day plan" — buy something with at least a thirty-day, money-back guarantee, use it and return it. During the events of the book, he uses it to get a metal detector, but the narration notes that he's previously used this method to furnish his room with a different stereo every month, and to get a radar detector.

Live Action TV

• In an Angel episode, Cordelia talks about dressing impressively as a struggling actress by buying dresses from expensive stores and then returning them after wearing them once.
• In an episode of Derry Girls, the group try to use this method to get dresses for the school dance; however, when Mae tries to subject Jenny to a Carrie-style drenching (albeit in tomato juice instead of pig's blood), the girls try to push her out of the way and get themselves also covered in tomato juice.
• Friends: Ross tries to move his new couch in with only Chandler and Rachel for help. In an attempt to make it more manageable for the three of them he cuts it in half, effectively destroying it. He still tries to return it for a refund.
  Ross: Look, I am a reasonable man. I will accept store credit.
  Saleswoman: I'll give you store credit in the amount of four dollars.
  Ross: (Beat) I take it.
• In an episode of The Golden Girls, Blanche carefully removes the tags from a dress so she can wear it and return it later. Her plan backfires when Dorothy accidentally spills something on the dress. Blanche has it dry-cleaned and tries to return it, but the store employees aren't fooled because Blanche forgot to remove the dry-cleaning tag.
• In the B-Plot of one Grounded for Life episode, Lily goes on a large shopping spree and tries to return the clothes she purchased (essentially treating it as a kind of rental), only to find out that the refund would be provided in the form of store credit. This, and her going on an angry tirade that pissed off the store manager, led to her being forced to Work Off the Debt she accrued on her parents' credit card to avoid being arrested.
• In the B-plot of the Good Luck Charlie episode, "Baby's New Shoes", Amy buys a $400.00 pair of high-heel shoes for a fancy party, but plans to return them to the store after the party. Unfortunately for Amy, Charlie finds the shoes and runs around the yard wearing them, getting them dirty and leaving Amy unable to return them. And when she actually does and tries to weasel out of it, they apparently laugh to her face and demand that she pay for them.
• Kim's Convenience
  • Appa attempts to return a dress Umma purchased for a cancelled wedding to the store, but the employee assumes that it's a scam to return the dress after it's already been worn and inspects it for signs of use. Not liking the employee's condescending attitude, Appa tries to save face by claiming he is there to buy a purse to accompany the dress.
  • Umma buys a new dishwasher, but Appa buys the same model from another store for a lower price using a fake flyer. After the dishwasher Appa bought is installed, he tries to return the other one to the store, but it turns out it was Umma's dishwasher that they installed and the staff member won't accept the return because Appa's dishwasher has a different serial number embedded in the door. At Jung's suggestion, Appa tries swapping the doors of the dishwashers, but he can't reconnect the complicated wiring, leaving Umma once again with an inoperable dishwasher.
• In an episode of The King of Queens, Carrie takes advantage of several upscale clothing stores' return policies to essentially "rent" clothes by buying them and then refunding them. The scheme collapses after her husband Doug spills food over a $1000 dress and she loses track of all the "rented" clothes and their corresponding receipts, leaving her with a closet full of expensive clothes and a maxed-out credit card.
• Lizzie McGuire: At Miranda's advice, Lizzie buys a pair of expensive jeans to wear to a party and then return. Of course, before she even makes it to the party, someone spills a drink on the jeans and they're ruined, forcing her to wear a less-fashionable pair her mom had gotten her. Since they're so unique, these jeans turn out to be very popular, and the final lesson of the episode is that Lizzie is embarrassed for looking down on her mom's style and not taking the time to go shopping together.
• Murdoch Mysteries: In one episode, Murdoch spends some scenes working undercover in a store. He spots foul play when someone comes to return a camera, correctly deducing the customer used it for a wedding, but is told the bad publicity from rejecting return policy abusers would hurt the store more than the abuse itself.
• Parks and Recreation: Tom Haverford reveals this is how he maintains his extravagant lifestyle despite working a low-level government job and being in massive debt. He buys expensive and luxurious goods, uses them, and then on the last day of the policy, returns them to the store pretending he never used them (he is not above using tears and other self-humiliations to shame store personnel into accepting the returns), then uses the money to buy more goods. Occasionally, it backfires on him, with the items either getting broken or lost, and him struggling to come up with the money.
• That's So Raven: The premise of "Point of No Return" is Raven needs a scientific calculator for her classes, so Victor gives her $100 to buy it. However, Raven instead spends the money on an expensive dress, planning to wear it to the big party that night, return it the next day, and then use the refund to buy the calculator. However, before she can get to the party, Raven drops her lipstick on the dress, forcing her, Chelsea, and Eddie to stay up all night trying to get the stain out. Following several other disasters, she almost gets away with it, but the store finds out and refuses to take the dress back, leaving her father forced to pay $200, and him making her work to pay it off.
• What I Like About You: When Henry wins an award, Gary gets him a nice suit jacket to wear to the awards ceremony, but warns him to leave the tags on. Then Henry winds up missing the ceremony to help Holly through a crisis. Holly is grateful and helpfully removes the tag he left on his jacket.
• After Christine buys a new television set for her bedroom in the Yes, Dear episode, "Who's On First?", Jimmy follows suit by charging other expensive luxury items to her credit card. When Christine is outraged, Jimmy tells her that they don't have to pay the credit card company for 30 days, and can return their stuff in 29 days as long as they keep their boxes and receipts. In The Stinger, the store only provides him with store credit (in the amount of $15,487.00), so he has to trade his store credit for cash from customers who are about to make their purchases.

Radio

• My Favorite Husband (a radio program prototype for I Love Lucy): Liz Cugat, played by Lucille Ball, accidentally returns a dress she bought, on-sale at a low-end store, to a more-high-end store, and starts to abuse the system to make a little bit of cash. (The beleaguered refunds-department manager gets his payback on Liz when he realizes that she's been scamming him, and Liz later has to find a way to pawn them off on other people, including her own husband.)

Webcomics

• In a Wondermark strip, a man attempts to "return" a broken toaster despite not having a receipt or the actual toaster. Before the salesman can presumably tell him to leave, the manager pays him fifty bucks for the toaster, claiming money is worth it in order to ensure customer satisfaction and brand loyalty. The salesman points out that it also encourages entitlement and gives the store a reputation for having gullible employees. Sure enough, another customer enters asking to return the building they are standing in.

Web Original

• In the Strong Bad Email "what i want", Strong Bad encourages his audience to take advantage of local retailers where the seasonal workers will be too apathetic to enforce the return policy. He claims to have returned an unreturnable food item, to a store that couldn't possibly have sold it, for far more money than it was worth.
  Strong Bad: But if it doesn't work, don't forget to take advantage of all the temporary help that retailers hire this time of year. Those people will refund anything! Last year, I returned an omelette to a hardware store for nigh on fifty bucks.
• One segment on What the Fuck Is Wrong with You? featured a suspicious customer returning used enemas. In turn, Tara has mentioned incidents at Spencers Gifts in which customers returned products in extremely dubious condition — including sex toys.
• In an episode of Game Grumps, Arin relates how when he lived in Florida and worked at a Disney giftshop, he would do this to get a little extra cash when he was short. A local Walmart had a very generous no receipt, no questions asked, cash return policy, and the giftshop would have a lot of the same items as the Walmart, so Arin would use his employee discount to buy something and then return it at the Walmart for slightly more.

Western Animation

• The Simpsons:
  • In "Bart's Dog Gets an F" after Santa's Little Helper chews up Homer's expansive and newly bought sneakers, Homer attempts to return it, claiming they just fell apart in the dog's mouth. The sales clerk simply refuses.
    Sales Clerk: I'm sorry, sir, our warranty doesn't cover fire, theft, or acts of dog.
  • In "Mom and Pop Art", Homer tries to build a barbecue pit with a kit from a home improvement store. After a hilariously bad attempt at putting it together, Homer tries to return it as a mess of parts stuck in dry cement.
    Pop: All return items must be in a box and accompanied by a receipt.
    Homer: Well, if you follow the flashlight, you'll see the receipt embedded here and here, and elements of the box here, here and possibly here.
    Pop: Sorry, I didn't get this hammer-hat by handing out refunds.
  • After Marge buys a $500 purse and is able to return it after enjoying it for one day in "Loan-A-Lisa", Homer becomes addicted to buying and returning stuff for bogus reasons.
• In the 1960 Popeye cartoon "Popeye Goes Sale-ing", Olive Oyl drags Popeye to a department store. Being Ms. Red Ink, Olive constantly has Popeye get a refund on her purchases whenever she thinks she's found a better bargain. Every time Popeye takes merchandise to the return counter, the clerk has him fill out a pile of forms in triplicate.
• In the SpongeBob SquarePants episode 'Pickles', the antagonist Bubble Bass demands a refund from Mr. Krabs due to SpongeBob's improperly making a Krabby Patty by forgetting the pickles.^note Though in reality, he hid the pickles under his tongue. To drive the point home, BB points out a money-back guarantee on the Krusty Krab menu (which is written very tiny). Krabs, being the cheapskate he is, desperately tries to make Bubble Bass reconsider, to no avail.

Real Life

• American wholesale club retailer Costco is known for their generous return policy. In 2018, a woman drew the ire of fellow customers by trying to return a dead Christmas tree after Christmas Day. According to witnesses, staff were reluctant to accept the return, but ultimately did so to avoid further confrontation.
• The Steam Refund Policy states that you can get a full refund on a game purchase if you have played it for less than two hours. Of course, if your entire game takes less than that to complete, there's absolutely nothing stopping people from refunding it once they are done, essentially playing it for free.
• The Amazon Kindle Store has a policy that ebooks can be fully refunded within one week of purchase. After complaints from the Authors Guild about speedy readers abusing the policy to read books for free, Amazon amended it in 2022 so that books can no longer be refunded if over 10% of them are read.
• L.L. Bean was forced to cancel their lifetime 100% refund policy and replace it with a limited timespan with receipt policy after some incidents where people started demanding a refund of the purchase price of items they had acquired secondhand.
• In areas that suffer seasonal heat waves retailers that sell portable air-conditioning units will often have a "no returns" or "exchange only returns" policy for the units to prevent people from buying them and then returning them once the heat wave is over.
• In one famous story about customer service, someone went to Nordstrom and tried to return a car tire, without a receipt. Even though Nordstrom doesn't sell tires. Nordstrom honored the return. What's left out or missed is the part where Nordstrom had bought a department store that did sell tires, and closed that section down, so the customer was trying to find that section to return the tire he bought. He wasn't a scammer or mistaken.