Consumer return policies in presence of a P2P market
Consumer return policies in presence of a P2P market
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DOI：
10.1016/j.omega.2019.07.008
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发表时间：
2020-12
影响因子：
6.9
通讯作者：
Tingting Li;Jinxing Xie;Xin Liu
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
Tingting Li;Jinxing Xie;Xin Liu
零售商销售具有估值不确定性的产品，往往会向消费者提供退货政策，以刺激需求。然而，由于零售商对退货的严格限制或由于试用期短，一些不符合消费者期望的产品无法退回给零售商。随着电子商务的发展，无法将产品退回零售商的消费者可以通过电子点对点（P2P）二手商品市场直接转售给他人。本文考察了当消费者具有战略性且对其估值不确定时，P2P市场的存在对零售商最优退货政策的影响。作为一个基准，我们首先研究零售商的最优退货政策时，只有一个零售商运行的转售市场。然后，我们分析了零售商经营的转售市场和P2P市场的零售商的最优退货策略。理论和数值结果表明，首先，P2P市场的存在是不利的零售商在大多数情况下。P2P市场的存在只有在单位购买成本很高、消费者对P2P市场产品的接受度相对较高、P2P市场交易成本相对较低的情况下才有利于零售商;第二，P2P市场的存在提高了消费者剩余;第三，当零售商经营的转售市场是唯一的二手产品市场时，退货产品销售一空;而在P2P市场中，当单位采购成本很低时，零售商会持有一定的库存;第四，随着P2P市场的出现，新产品的售价提高，零售商经营的转售市场的二手产品售价降低，而大多数情况下退款金额增加。
Retailers selling products with valuation uncertainty often offer return policies to consumers to stimulate demand. However, some products that do not meet consumers’ expectations cannot be returned to the retailers either because of retailers’ strict restrictions on returns or because of short trial period. With the development of e-commerce, consumers who cannot return their products to retailers can resell them directly to others through electronic peer-to-peer (P2P) second-hand goods markets. This paper examines the effect of the presence of a P2P market on a retailer’s optimal return policy when the consumers are strategic and uncertain about their valuations. As a benchmark, we first examine the retailer’s optimal return policy when there is only a retailer-run resale market. Then, we analyze the retailer’s optimal return policy in presence of both the retailer-run resale market and the P2P market. Theoretical and numerical results show that, first, the presence of the P2P market is detrimental to the retailer in most cases. The presence of the P2P market is beneficial to the retailer only when the unit purchasing cost is very high, the consumers’ acceptance of products in the P2P market is relatively high and the transaction cost in the P2P market is relatively low; second, the consumer surplus is improved by the presence of P2P market; third, when the retailer-run resale market is the only second-hand products market, returned products are sold out; while in presence of the P2P market, the retailer will hold some inventory when the unit purchasing cost is very low; fourth, the selling price of new products is increased and the selling price of second-hand products in the retailer-run resale market is decreased with the emergence of the P2P market while the refund amount is increased in most cases.