There are a multitude of perks to being an Amazon Prime Member, including next day delivery, early access to lighting deals and exclusive discounts. However, on Monday the company announced that they will be stopping one of its most popular services.
The end of this month will see the end of members being able to place orders using their subscriber benefit of ‘Try Before You Buy’. This option lets shoppers try on select clothing, accessories and shoes before buying the item and is to terminate on January 31.
The company has confirmed that this service will now be phasing out due to limited reach and increasing use of AI features to try on clothing. The feature was first launched way back in 2018, after being trailed through a feature called Prime Wardrobe in 2017.
‘Try Before You Buy’ was created to solve issues around online shopping – will it fit and will I suit it? The feature allowed paying members to select up to six items, that were part of the scheme, from their broad range of shoes and clothing.
The items would then be sent to the customers at no extra cost, where they would be given a seven days to try-on period. Customers could then choose to return the item without being charged. Many people used the perk to try on different sizes of the same item.
A spokesperson from Amazon has said: “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.”
On hearing the news, people on Reddit expressed how they feel about saying goodbye to this feature. One person said: “That’s such a bummer, but I’m not surprised. It’s seemed harder to find on their app every time I’ve used it over the last year or two, and I’m sure it was abused.
I’ll miss the option to use it for shoes – that’s really where I found it the most helpful.”
Another is happy to see the feature go. They expressed: “Good, it was a stupid scheme. I don’t know how it worked in the US but in the UK it was pointless – while you didn’t pay for all the items a hold was put on your card for the full amount, then you had to wait days after items were sent back before the hold was lifted – it was actually easier to pay for everything and then get a refund for items not needed.”
However, a third said that they will miss the feature: “It’s too bad the feature is disappearing. I used it many times to try on clothing.”
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