Blame AI for Amazon’s latest change of dropping its popular “Try Before You Buy” perk for customers.
The service, which launched in 2018, allows shoppers to order up to six select clothing items, shoes, jewelry, watches, or accessories to their home, try them on, and have seven days to return them without being charged. For the giant online retailer, this was a move to echo the experience of shopping in-stores—and a lot of customers have enjoyed the offer.
But, its time has come to an end.
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Amazon confirms it’s phasing out “Try Before You Buy.”
“When I log in, I see a message ‘Prime Try Before You Buy will end on 01/31/2025,’” an Amazon customer posted to Reddit on
January 9. “I called Amazon and asked why they are ending this in my account. The customer service agent said that it is not just for me, the company is ending this feature For [sic] every one. I am shocked.”
“Prime Try Before You Buy” is ending.
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Indeed, Amazon confirmed to
USA Today on Tuesday, Jan. 14, that they are phasing out the program.
A
spokesperson explained that “Try Before You Buy,” while convenient, wasn’t widely applicable to most of Amazon’s insanely large selection of clothing, shoes, and accessories. What’s more, it’s being pushed out by the company’s rapid adoption of new AI features.
“Given the combination of Try Before You Buy only scaling to a limited number of items and customers increasingly using our new AI-powered features like virtual try-on, personalized size recommendations, review highlights, and improved size charts to make sure they find the right fit, we’re phasing out the Try Before You Buy option, effective January 31, 2025,” the spokesperson said.
What fans have loved about the service:
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Exclusively reserved for Amazon Prime members, the free “Try Before You Buy” service pops up as an option next to eligible clothing, shoes, or accessory listings. The checkout process is slightly different than your average order, and customers need a credit card in order to complete the transaction. A 7-day hold is placed on their card for the items they’d like to try, which ship free within 4 to 6 business days.
Once a shopper receives their items, they have 7 days to try them on and decide which to keep or return. Returns are free, and the shopper is only charged for the pieces they keep after 11:59 PM local time on the seventh day.
As fans have noted, this perk is great when shopping for big events, like a wedding or party, for which they need to try on several sizes or styles of dresses, pants, or shoes to find the perfect fit.
“Damn, I really liked this feature cause lord knows what size pants I wear depending on the brand. It was nice to get two sizes to see which ones fit the best,” one Reddit user wrote.
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Bummer times for these Amazon Prime members, but you have until January 31, 2025 to continue to use the service.
The retail giant is betting big on new AI features.
Amazon is sunsetting “Try Before You Buy” because it believes its four new AI-powered offerings will replace the need to physically try on items.
Now, shoppers can test out the virtual try-on experience to see how various clothing, shoes, and accessories will look on them. Of course, AI is an emerging technology and isn’t entirely accurate, so you’ll need to be the judge of how well this feature simulates a real fitting.
To help, Amazon is also offering AI-backed personalized size recommendations and “improved” size charts. Customer reviews are also summarized by AI for shoppers to quickly get the gist of an item’s overall fit and quality.
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Here’s how this change will affect you:
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The “Try Before You Buy” option will cease on January 31, 2025. From that point on, you’ll need to rely on Amazon’s AI innovations to gauge the best size and fit for you on any given fashion purchase.
However, Amazon’s spokesperson says that getting rid of their now-outdated try-on service can make your shopping experience better with “a single, simplified experience with wider selection and faster delivery speeds.” Meaning: Their new AI features and pre-existing shipping times for Prime members apply to all listings, not just a specified selection like the “Try Before You Buy” service had.
So, you can ship and return items quickly and for free if you’re already a Prime member. Simply make an AI-educated guess on fashion buys, then return items that don’t fit at Amazon stores, Whole Foods, Staples, Kohl’s, or The UPS Store.
However, note that you may encounter a return shipping fee, depending on the item, which will be deducted from your refund. And, as of June 1, 2024, Amazon has been hitting frequent returners with an additional fee—but, as of now, this does not apply to apparel and shoes.