TikTok Adds More Flexible Options for Sellers

TikTok’s added some new options for those selling items in the app, via TikTok Shop or otherwise, including enhanced controls for shipping and returns, and optional delivery terms.

Which will give retailers increased flexibility in managing their sales through the app.

As per TikTok:

“You spoke. We listened. We're here to make your seller journey as frictionless as possible. Although we can't guarantee that shop flexibility will have you touching your toes, we hope these new features provide better support as you continue your selling journey on TikTok Shop.”

First off, TikTok will now enable sellers to automate approval of aftersales requests, including returns, refunds, replacements and cancelations.

That’ll enable greater capacity in dealing with aftersales issues, while also ensuring that sellers remain in control over their customer relationships.

TikTok enables sellers to set their own parameters around returns, with a window ranging from 14 to 90 days (note: local retail laws will also pay a part in this element).

TikTok sellers will also now be able to exclude PO box deliveries, to avoid complications in sending.

“Using the PO Box exclusion feature prevents PO Boxes from being entered as a delivery address, so you can avoid order cancelations and Delivered Not Received (DNR) notices.”

It’s also rolling out custom cancelation and return time windows, giving sellers more capacity to manage their cancelation time frame.

TikTok will also now let fashion sellers set specific items in their store as “final sale,” reducing the capacity for returns.

“While this feature is currently only available for specific sub-categories, stay tuned for further updates!”

As with returns, this will also be relative to consumer regulations in each sellers’ region, but it could give fashion businesses another means to solidify their sales via the app.

Finally, TikTok’s changes will also enable retailers to set custom handling times to process orders.

“Qualified sellers can extend shipping handling times from three business days to up to seven business days. Align TikTok Shop's shipping service-level agreement with your internal operations while keeping customers up-to-speed on shipping timelines.”

So overall, these updates will give TikTok sellers more capacity to set clearer expectations around their products, and sales generated through the app. Of course, some of these could be misused, leading to a lesser customer experience. But that will also impact your brand, and eventually your sales moving forward.

So even with these changes, you still need to set time frames that will align with customer needs. But they may provide more capacity to build your process around TikTok’s systems.

You can read more about TikTok’s latest Shop updates here.