Returns condition disputes, settled with photos taken when the box is opened.
Your team grades a return as damaged. The brand says it was fine when the customer sent it back and asks you to cover the credit. Without a photo tied to that return, it is your word against theirs. Returns condition disputes come down to what someone can show, so we build the capture at the returns bench that produces it.
Example workflow. Not client work.
Why returns arguments are lost
Returns are processed fast, often at the end of a line, by people judging condition by eye. The grade goes into the WMS as a code. The photo, if one was taken, sits on someone’s phone or in a shared folder with no link to the return.
Weeks later the brand questions a grade or a missing item, and the only record is the code. Nobody can show what the box held when it was opened, who opened it or when. The 3PL usually absorbs the cost, even when the grade was right, because nothing shows that it was.
What we would build
- Input. The expected return, read from the RMA (return authorization) or the return label, and each brand's own condition rules: what counts as resellable, what counts as damaged, which items need extra photos.
- Capture. The associate scans the return label before cutting the box. The screen then asks for the photos that brand requires, in order: the outer box, the contents as opened, the item, the tags or seals. Each photo is stamped with the time, the bench and the associate.
- Check. The item scanned is compared with the item expected on the return. The associate answers the brand's condition questions, and the grade comes from the brand's rules instead of from memory.
- Exception. A wrong item, an empty box or a grade the rules cannot decide goes to a returns lead with the photos. Nothing is restocked until the lead or the brand decides.
- Record. The grade, photos, times and names are tied to the return. The brand can be sent a link to it, and when a grade is questioned, your team opens the record instead of searching for a photo.
How it fits beside your WMS
- Your WMS keeps the return. Expected returns and the final grade move between it and the returns bench through its API or export, where it offers one. The photo record lives beside it, linked by the return number. Cargohold has a client portal for 3PLs where a 3PL’s clients see their own stock, orders and invoices.
- Brand rules become the grading. Each brand’s condition rules are set up once with your team and used every time, so two associates grade the same item the same way. The bench screen itself is one of the custom internal tools we build, written around your line rather than bought off a shelf.
- On the devices at the bench. A phone or tablet on a stand at each bench is enough for most returns lines, using devices you already own.
Where your team decides
The associate decides what they see in the box, and the brand’s rules turn that into a grade. A returns lead decides the cases the rules cannot. Whether an item is restocked, refurbished or written off, and whether a customer is refunded, stays with the brand. The record shows what was in the box; it does not decide who pays.
Sample return
Grade a fictional return against a fictional brand's rules.
Interactive simulation · sample data
A fictional brand, Cedar Row, with its own condition rules. A return arrives at bench 2. Pick what is in the box.
Choose what happens
Pick one above. Nothing here is live: no call is placed, no message is sent and nothing is saved.
Questions
What proof settles a returns condition dispute?
A photo of the item, taken when the box was opened, with the time, the bench and the associate attached to it and the return number on the record. A photo on someone’s phone with no link to the return settles nothing, because nobody can show which return it belongs to.
How long should return photos be kept?
Long enough to cover the window in which a brand can question a grade, which is in your agreement with them rather than in our software. You set the period, we build to it, and it is written into the scope with where the photos are stored.
Does this slow the returns line down?
It adds the photos the brand requires, and only those. We set the photo list per brand with your team and test the time it adds on your own bench during the build.
Can brands see the photos?
If you choose. A brand can be sent a link to one return or given a view of its own returns only.
Do we have to replace our WMS?
No. The WMS keeps the return and its grade. The photos and the grading steps sit beside it.
What happens when a brand questions a grade?
Tell us how returns are graded today and what the brand asks for when they disagree. Someone from our team replies within one business day.