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Ten numbers, reviewed monthly, that tell you whether returns are keeping customers or quietly losing them.
Most returns reports show the return rate and a cost. The scorecard below follows the trip from the promise to the next order, so a problem shows up where it starts.
| Number | How to count it | Good direction | Warning sign |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. Return rate, by value | Refunded and exchanged value ÷ gross sales, by category | Stable or falling, for the right reasons | Falling after a fee, with repeat falling too |
| 2. Top-20 product return rates | Each product against its own last quarter | Falling after fixes | The same product on the list three months running |
| 3. “Other” as a reason | Share of returns with a vague or blank reason | Under 10% | Rising: the list is missing something |
| 4. Outcome mix | Exchange, credit and refund shares of returns | Exchange share rising | Refund share rising after a portal change |
| 5. Second-return rate on exchanges | Exchanges returned again ÷ exchanges | Low and falling | Rising: size guidance is off |
| 6. Days, request to first scan | Median | Short | Rising: sending back has become harder |
| 7. Days, first scan to refund | Median, and share refunded at scan | Same day for most | Any rise without a decision behind it |
| 8. Cost per return | Label, handling and write-off ÷ returns | Falling | Falling while metric 10 falls |
| 9. Return tickets per 100 returns | Support contacts about returns | Falling | Rising after any change to the portal or policy |
| 10. Repeat rate by outcome | 90-day and twelve-month repeat, split by how the first return ended | Returners close to non-returners | A widening gap between refund and exchange |
Quarterly, add the count of customers above your serial-returner line and any holdout results.
The fourth number is the one that moves fastest when you change the portal, so chart it. Picture a brand that reorders its outcome screen and adds a small bonus for exchanges:
In the chapter 4 example, that shift was worth about $3,500 a month after paying the bonus. The chart shows the change happened; only the holdout shows it paid.
Report the outcome mix next to the return rate, every month. One tells you the cost; the other tells you what you kept.
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If this is your store
The free Klaviyo audit reads your own account and scores it. Start with your store’s address. A read-only key gets the full report.
Written by Andrew Lauchner, a growth and retention operator for consumer brands. The paid work is one ninety-day Sprint.
This is one chapter of The Return Trip, which is free and readable in full on a single page with no form in front of it.