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Amazon Slammed for Destroying As-New and Returned Goods (fortune.com)

Posted by msmash on from the stranger-things dept.

Amazon is destroying "massive amounts" of as-new and returned items, raising the ire of the German government and environmental campaigners, local media reported. Fortune: The types of items being destroyed here go way beyond the "health and personal care" products that Amazon has long been destroying when people return them, for sanitary reasons. We're talking things like washing machines, smartphones and furniture. The revelation drew an angry response from the German government and environmental campaigners. "This is a huge scandal," Jochen Flasbarth from the German environment ministry told WirtschaftsWoche. "We are consuming these resources despite all the problems in the world. This approach is not in step with our times." Greenpeace's Kirsten Brodde said there was a need for a new "law on banning the waste and destruction of first-hand and usable goods."

15 of 209 comments (clear)

  1. It's about cost... by MikeDataLink · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I sell some products on Amazon. In many cases (especially electronics) Amazon will not/can not determine if the product is actually good or bad (ex: a consumer firewall that customer claims is not stable or reboots). It's most likely cheaper to have Amazon destroy it than to pay to ship it back, pay an employee to test it and repackage it, list it on feeBay as used/open box to resell it, and pay to ship it yet again (if its even good).

    Mike

    --
    Mike @ The Geek Pub. Let's Make Stuff!
    1. Re:It's about cost... by Joce640k · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Does it have to be destroyed on the off-chance?

      There's plenty of people out there who'd take that risk if they could pay less than full price.

      --
      No sig today...
    2. Re:It's about cost... by Chris+Mattern · · Score: 5, Insightful

      There's plenty of people out there who'd say they'd take the risk for a lower price, but would then turn around and sue you if it turned out bad. They'd probably win, too, no matter what they signed; there are consumer rights you can't sign away. So Amazon can't resell this junk.

    3. Re:It's about cost... by ChromeAeonuim · · Score: 2, Insightful

      A European government getting angry at an American company over a complex problem without proposing a viable solution? What a shocker. And look, Greenpeace is at it too, natch.

    4. Re:It's about cost... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

      There's plenty of people out there who'd take that risk if they could pay less than full price.

      I think this is precisely the point. After accounting for risks, the business can't sell it for less than full price.

      Even if the business sells it AS-IS there is still the issue of having your name/brand on it.
      When some idiot buys AS-IS because it's cheaper, he'll still go on social media to complain about it.
      When the business says, sorry, but you bought it AS-IS, social media will still skewer the brand of the "heartless business" to shit.

      And for what purpose? Barely breaking even on shit merchandise?
      I don't think any business would sign up for that.

      Basically, if there is a law, Amazon is going to ship all the stuff to a huge flea market.
      There it will sit until the folks there figure out what the businesses already did:
      This stuff isn't worth crap, time to pitch it.

      Next, a law on disposal of flea market goods.

    5. Re:It's about cost... by DarkOx · · Score: 3, Insightful

      No you want to dictate to them how they dispose of their property. You're a totalitarian a-hole just admit it.

      Amazon IS accepting the consequences of their model. They accept most returns from their customers no questions asked. They eat the cost of the returned merchandise. Once they accept the return its their property again! They can do whatever they want with it! That is the way it should be!

      --
      Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
    6. Re:It's about cost... by XXongo · · Score: 5, Insightful

      If you read the second of the links on the German language website (which you have to click through to get to-- should have been linked here but it wasn't), it makes exactly these points: the "Scandal" is mostly invented; Amazon doesn't destroy stuff it doesn't have to, and they go to some amount of effort to sell at lower cost, or donate, stuff that is returned but can't be resold "as new". https://www.wortfilter.de/wp/h... (translate: https://translate.google.com/t... )

    7. Re:It's about cost... by DarkOx · · Score: 1, Insightful

      No I am describing a situation my primary concern is personal property rights. Its no business of yours or anyone else's what I do with my property or what Amazon does with theirs. If I want *want* purchase 1000 iPhone X's to use in place of clay pigeons over my field - that's all me.

      You have all ready legislated all sorts of consumer rights where Amazon has to take returns in the first place and now you want to seek to tell them what they can with the returned goods - who they can sell it to when under what circumstances etc. You are basically going full command economy on them!

      Should we have basic laws that prevent them from doing obviously harmful things like dumping them at sea or something - yes but beyond that they should be able to dispose them how they wish - resale, recycler, refuse heap etc. Keep in mind they probably have to PAY to have the trash hauled away too. They are not 'getting some kind of free ride here'.

      --
      Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
    8. Re:It's about cost... by DarkOx · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Interestingly I don't give a flying fuck about your personal health - I value my freedom and I want to protect the freedom of my children etc.

      I am not trying to destroy the planet. I am not suggesting Amazon should just be able to dump about PCBs and lead batteries in the local wilderness area or something. I am saying they have basic rights to what they want with stuff that belongs to them. If you care so much go live in mud hut and eat only raw vegetation foraged etc and leave the rest of us alone.

      --
      Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
    9. Re:It's about cost... by Ol+Olsoc · · Score: 1, Insightful

      I still like my idea of shipping everything returned to Germany at full price plus shipping, all to be covered by Germany. Who could oppose that - especially when the good people of Germany are demanding to control what Amazon does? Step up and do your duty.

      I'm confused - do you think Amazon Germany should NOT be subject to German laws?

      Germany is only one country, As the European Union has shown, they want world domination. All of it - every single return sent back to Amazon must go to Germany.

      --
      The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
  2. Not new.. by sqorbit · · Score: 3, Insightful

    This is not new, companies have been doing this for a long time. Companies now are probably destroying items daily. Amazon just happens to be big enough to get caught. Not that we should be defending Amazon or this practice but it's always easier to blame large companies.

    --
    Sent from my TARDIS
  3. Re:Losing the right of abuse by mi · · Score: 3, Insightful

    It will be limited to those "engaged in economic activity" — like GDPR and the entire "right to be forgotten" concept. There will be people welcome this intervention and lamenting, once again, "why the US can't be more like Europe".

    Insert the cautionary tale beginning with the "when they came for corporations I did not object, because I do not have a corporation" here...

    --
    In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
  4. Something similar happened to me by timholman · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I ordered an external battery pack for a UPS from Amazon several months back. When it arrived and I unpacked it, the case was visibly bulging on the top. Not wanting to risk plugging it in, I contacted Amazon for a return. Instead, they refunded my money on the spot and told me to take it to the nearest recycling center.

    I could understand Amazon's reasoning. Why risk shipping a possibly defective battery that might pose a fire hazard? And for what I paid for it, it was hardly worth trying to repair or refurbish.

    From Amazon's point of view, if it's cheaper to dispose of the goods rather than repair or refurbish them, then that's the smart move. They can't even donate them, because what happens if a lawyer sues because someone was injured by a donated item that Amazon knew was defective? The much safer route, economically and legally, is simply to destroy the returned items. It's part of the cost of doing business at their scale.

  5. Re: automotive scandal by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

    F your whataboutism crap. They sent people to jail, which cunt Americans do not do. You and everyone else bends over and spreads.

  6. Liar by DogDude · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Too bad the Germans didn't get so incensed when - every single one - of their automotive companies lied about diesel emissions and wrote software specifically to fool testing....

    You're a liar. "The Germans" certainly did "get so incensed". They sent people to prison over it.

    --
    I don't respond to AC's.