Beauty Returns and Exchanges on WhatsApp, Within Your Policy
This recipe handles “can I return this” and “wrong shade, can I change it?” on WhatsApp, Instagram and web chat. It finds the order, checks it against your return window and your rules for opened products, offers a shade exchange where your policy allows it, and explains the next step. Leaks, damage and anything outside your policy go to your team. Part of the beauty store workflows.
What happens today
A customer writes “the foundation is too dark for me, can I exchange it?”. Someone has to check the order date, check whether she has opened it, explain the hygiene rule, check the lighter shade is in stock and tell her how to post it back. Each step is a separate message. If the rule is explained badly, a customer who would have taken an exchange leaves a one-star review instead.
Beauty return policies are stricter than most, because opened products usually cannot be resold. That makes a clear, consistent explanation more important.
The flow that works
- The customer asks to return or exchange. AeroChat finds the order and checks the email or phone number matches.
- It asks which item and why, and whether it has been opened or used.
- It checks your policy: the return window, the rule for opened products, and any items that cannot be returned.
- Where the policy allows it, it offers an exchange for another shade and checks it is in stock.
- It explains how to send the item back, and books your courier’s pickup if you offer one.
- It opens a return request on the order in Shopify for your team to approve. Damaged, leaking or wrong items go to your team with a photo.
The recipe
Copy this into AeroChat
When a customer asks to return or exchange a product, follow these steps.
- Ask for their order number, then look up the order in Shopify and check the email or phone number matches the customer.
- Ask which product and why, and whether it has been opened or used.
- If the product arrived damaged, leaking or wrong, do not decide anything. Ask for a photo of the product and the parcel, tag the conversation “return issue” and hand it to our team with the order number.
- If they say the product caused a reaction, stop and follow the reaction handover.
- Check our return policy. Example: unopened products can be returned within 14 days of delivery. Opened products cannot be returned, except one exchange for a different shade of the same product within 7 days if at least 80% remains. Sale items and sets cannot be returned. Tell them plainly what applies to their item.
- If an exchange is allowed, check the shade they want is in stock and confirm the exchange. If they are not sure which shade, use our shade guide and offer two options.
- Explain how to return the item. Post it to the return address in our policy and send us a photo of the postage receipt.
- Open a return request on the order in our store with the product and the reason, and note whether it is opened or unopened and whether the customer wants an exchange or a refund. Our team approves it.
Never approve a refund yourself. Never offer a discount, store credit or exception that is not in our policy. If the customer is upset, hand to our team. Reply in the customer’s language.
Change the policy example to your own before you paste it. It is there to show the level of detail the recipe needs.
What to connect
- Shopify. Built in, for order lookup, stock checks on the exchange shade, and return requests on the order. Your team approves each return in Shopify admin.
- Your return policy and shade guide. Upload both to the knowledge base, including your return address and the rule for opened products.
- Your courier, if you offer return pickups. If your courier has a public API for shipments and pickups, it connects through that API with the key from your courier account, and AeroChat can book the pickup in the chat.
Using a different system? If it has a public API, it connects to AeroChat the same way: describe what you want, paste in its key, and it runs.
Can’t find your tool? Message us in the chat on this page and we’ll tell you how it connects.
What you still decide
- Your return window and the rule for opened products.
- Whether you allow shade exchanges, and on what condition.
- Every refund, and any exception.
- What your team does for leaks and damage in transit.
The result to expect
Customers get your policy explained the same way every time, with the exchange offered where it applies and the stock already checked. Your team works from one list of returns on the way, in Shopify, and handles only the damaged items and exceptions.
Measure it with your own numbers: the share of return requests that become exchanges, and the time to resolve each one, before and after.
Next: restock and subscription questions.
Try a shade exchange
Install the app, paste the recipe and ask to change an opened foundation for a lighter shade. Check that the reply matches your policy word for word.
Install AeroChat from the Shopify App Store. Start your 7-day free trial, no credit card needed.
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