When ecommerce returns reduce profitability, you might think of logistics or tightening policies. But what if the fix has nothing to do with those? The real answers are in your data.

Gaining visibility into the causes of preventable returns can pay off. Narvar’s CEO told the Wall Street Journal that cutting ecommerce returns by half could increase profitability by up to 25%.

The right data shows how your store creates uncertainty before the sale, where operations break down, and when return policies cost you. Most ecommerce platforms offer built-in analytics or reporting dashboards to access these insights quickly. In WooCommerce, you can review refund rates and product performance in WooCommerce Analytics to discover patterns, understand them, and act.

Nearly 1 in 5 online orders comes back. NRF and Happy Returns put the ecommerce return rate at 19.3% of online sales for 2025, against 15.8% across all retail channels. There’s usually a common cause.…