Marketplace Loss Prevention – Retailer Updates

The e-commerce loss working group met to discuss the challenges of managing fraudulent claims for non-delivery and returns from sales made via online marketplaces such as Amazon, Ebay, Facebook, Walmart and Tik Tok, to name but a few.

After a short presentation from one of the retailers, the group shared back their questions, comments and their own learnings. The full recording of the meeting is available to retailers, if this is of interest, please send email to colin@ecrloss.com.

Three of the key highlights from the meeting include:

1) Reduced visibility: When retailers sell directly to the consumer, the full suite of fraud protection capabilities are available, with some of the tools looking at 600+ data points to identify possible risks. However, when retailers sell via a marketplace, visibility to data points that could help protect the retailer from fraud are significantly reduced, leading to a far greater risk. Retailers shared how criminals have become very aware of this weakness.

2) Limited Control: The group shared that the marketplace itself can have a bias and a tilt towards trusting customers first, and refunding the customer where there is a claim, while the retailer themselves would have been more likely to apply more caution and be more aware of the risk of fraud, especially on repeat offenders.

3) Collaboration Opportunity: Retailers reported that it was very difficult to find a person or team to contact at the marketplace retailers who could help support and investigate fraudulent claims. Where they had found a partners, they reported good success at recovering losses.

For a video recap of the launch meeting, please see video below with Professor Beck.