Reverse Logistics Professional

Experts from Philips, Best Buy and Genco share insights on how to utilize Return Allowances to Reduce Reverse Logistics Cost.

Despite good intentions, return allowances, if not done correctly, may not be a good solution to reduce Reverse Logistics costs.   Return Allowances started out as a quick and easy way for a manufacturer to give an allowance to the retailer to manage its returned items, thereby reducing the reverse logistics costs of processing, logistics and transportation for both parties.   The intention of a Return Allowances was to provide a quick and easy way to negotiate a win for everyone. 

However, if not thought through carefully, return allowances can have negative results for both the manufacturer and the retailer.  “Very often they are not saving anyone money”, explained Tony Sciarrotta, Director of Returns Management at Philips.  To help you better understand return allowances, Sciarrotta, John Slothower, Manager of Innovation and Services at Best Buy and Curtis Greve, President of Retail Services at Genco Supply Chain Solutions have shared some of their knowledge, insights and secrets to achieving better return allowances.

Many proactive companies are spending a lot of time trying to determine how to avoid returns.  If you could reduce Your No Trouble Found (NTF, NPF No Problem Found) how much of an impact would that have on your reverse logistics?  Below is a great Product Re-Design Tool and questionaire to help assess your products with the goal of reducing NFT returns.

If you need to analyze your Reverse Logistics systems and processes or to develop a Reverse Logistics business case to assess Return On Investment ROI for a project, it is difficult to know where to start.

Developing a Reverse Logistics framework for your company is an excellent way to start your analysis.  A framework diagram and document helps you organize the key areas of all your returns processing.

Some highlights are as follows...