After more than two decades of rapid expansion, e-commerce platforms appear to have reached another pivotal moment.

Stock competition, anti-involution measures, and rule adjustments - the cancellation of "refund-only" policies undoubtedly stands as one of the landmark events in the e-commerce sector this year.

This platform-introduced rule, designed to protect consumer rights, has been repeatedly criticized for abuse, accused of providing fertile ground for "wool-pulling parties" and exacerbating malicious "involution-style" competition.

After the end of "refund-only," small sellers who were once troubled by it remain watchful of changing atmospheres. Since opening their shops, their lives have fluctuated alongside the development and changes of e-commerce platforms. Recently, multiple small online shop owners were interviewed about their experiences navigating between platforms and consumers, where cooperation and gaming, trust and tension have permeated their lives for over a decade.

**Opening Shops**

In 2010, 28-year-old Qian Ge never imagined that rope braiding she did out of boredom would generate more than ten orders on an e-commerce platform.

At the time, pregnant and staying home, she frequently searched online for rope braiding tutorials. Besides passing time, she wanted to earn some living expenses through a craft skill. After gaining some foundation, she registered a shop account on an e-commerce platform, took several photos of handmade bracelets with her phone, and posted them on the webpage. Within a week, people inquired about products and placed orders.

Qian Ge felt delighted and decided to continue with braiding. At the time, she worked as an accountant at a small company in Wuxi while managing her online shop. Each month, she would allocate 500 yuan from her salary to source materials and research techniques. Before braiding, she would carefully observe sample images from different angles. Once, she needed a material called "wax thread." After purchasing domestic wax thread, she discovered it looked more like snakeskin texture, completely unrelated to wax texture. To achieve the desired effect, she bought various materials for comparison, with unused threads piling up in corners like small mountains. Eventually, she found a supplier specializing in Japanese threads and became their Chinese customer.

This dedication attracted more customers, with orders growing steadily. In 2012, after her online shop income stabilized, she quit her accounting job to focus entirely on shop management.

Before running an online shop, Baobao worked as an international buyer for a fast-fashion apparel brand company in Shanghai. In 2007, with rapid online shopping growth, she recognized this as a new opportunity and could leverage her work resources to find good products, so she opened a buying agent shop. In 2010, sensing continuous contraction in the foreign trade industry, Baobao decided to quit and focus on her online shop, transitioning to independent women's shoe design.

Baobao said choosing to open an online shop was also due to the platform's friendly and balanced mechanisms. At the time, opening an online shop required no fees, reducing trial-and-error costs. Meanwhile, third-party payment platforms provided guarantees for both buyers and sellers, with payments only transferred to sellers after buyers confirmed receipt.

"There was a harmonious, fair system where dispute issues were relatively few," she reflected. In her view, once transaction problems were resolved, opening a shop was very simple. She didn't prepare extensively before opening, "no deposit required, just upload ID card, then focus on making products and taking product photos."

Marketing and operations didn't require much effort then either. For a long time, Baobao used a DSLR camera to photograph products herself. Each new product launch, she only took 6 to 10 flat-lay product photos with realistic shooting style, which customers jokingly said looked less attractive than buyer photos. She once tried professional teams with lighting, but customers told her they preferred more authentic images.

Like her, Qian Ge initially used a Fuji digital camera. As phone camera functions evolved, she basically only used phones for photography. She didn't want photos to look too industrial, preferring to present products as they truly were. "I make handcrafts and don't want products to look exaggerated, otherwise customers would experience psychological disappointment upon receipt."

This environment allowed sellers to focus more on products. Qian Ge disliked making identical products to others and began researching niche handcraft markets. In 2014, when Germany won the Brazil World Cup, creating global excitement, she noticed Germany's black, red, yellow team colors while following the matches and decided to make World Cup customized bracelets. This product became a bestseller, reaching 60,000 yuan in monthly revenue.

At the time, she spent no money on advertising and traffic, relying on organic traffic to attract buyers. Looking back now, she finds it magical that in her first few years of entrepreneurship, the shop maintained daily views of around 10,000, creating several small hits monthly. "Natural traffic was very considerable then. After posting something, people might come within a week." Baobao also mentioned that platforms initially provided extensive free promotion to small sellers. Around 2010, as more people began using e-commerce platforms and actively browsing and favoriting products, "if products received many favorites or cart additions, the platform would help promote your items."

Also around 2010, e-commerce platforms adjusted search ranking rules, incorporating calculations of consumer evaluations of shop product descriptions, seller comprehensive ratings, and service quality.

Zheng Li, a 20-year online shopping user, could always find products she liked when she first started shopping online. "The interface was quite simple then. If I wanted bracelets, I'd type in desired styles and keywords to find rich product selections."

Most products were unavailable offline. In the early 2000s, young women popular followed Japanese fashion magazines. Zheng Li was delighted to discover platform sellers could quickly launch similar styles from magazines. Then, clicking into product pages, clothes were mostly displayed flat with ruler measurements. Model photos looked more modest than now - she remembers models looked like ordinary girls, unlike current internet celebrities pursuing ultra-thin aesthetics. "Now over 100 pounds seems considered fat, but for ordinary people, under 100 pounds isn't common."

Similarly, Ke Yu started using e-commerce platforms in 2008 and became quite enthusiastic. She recalls opening computers or phones after work, browsing almost daily until 1-2 AM.

In this environment, enthusiasm grew synchronously between buyers and sellers. Initially, Qian Ge didn't intend to expand her shop significantly, but watching steadily growing revenue and traffic, she developed aspirations: "I wanted to connect with more strangers and create better, higher-end products - that was my most simple wish then."

**The "Human Touch" of Old-Style Shopping**

In 2015, Qian Ge's online shop received a message popup. This was from a new customer named Xiao Zhou, a relatively thin girl from Wuxi. She carefully inquired about bracelet sizes, somewhat embarrassedly explaining her wrist circumference was only 13.5 centimeters, making it difficult to find suitable accessories - could she customize smaller sizes? Qian Ge readily agreed. After becoming a regular customer, they added each other on WeChat and frequently communicated.

In small sellers' narratives, many customers like Xiao Zhou existed. In earlier online shopping contexts, human communication was slower. Baobao recalls that despite detailed size annotations on product images and explanations of measurement methods and styling scenarios, many customers still wanted to discuss product details. During busiest periods, she employed six customer service staff, "initially, customers might communicate with you for three to four hours - this was very common."

Buyer Zheng Li also habitually communicated directly with sellers. Until 2016-2017, she still added some shop owners on WeChat. She misses the "human touch" in past communications: "There were no AI customer services then, all direct contact with shop owners or real customer service." When unsure about clothing sizes or styling scenarios, she would actively ask sellers and quickly receive targeted responses with high communication efficiency.

After comprehensive understanding before ordering, returns were relatively rare. Baobao said her early shop return rate was only 17%. Even when customers returned items, they packaged carefully, with both sides worried about troubling each other.

Through conversations, buyers and sellers might become closer friends. Learning Qian Ge also lived in Wuxi, Xiao Zhou met her in person, developing into offline friends. After opening a studio, Qian Ge had irregular schedules, often waking up around 11-12 noon. Knowing she didn't eat breakfast on time, Xiao Zhou would knock on her door to check, always carrying hot meals.

Baobao enjoyed chatting with customers, with everyone moving from platform groups to WeChat, discussing not only shopping experiences but sharing lives. When someone visited new places and asked in groups, group members would enthusiastically recommend. Most memorable was a girl who started buying shoes during university - Baobao later witnessed her graduation, work, marriage, and received celebratory eggs after childbirth.

Recalling those experiences, Qian Ge felt she often sensed beauty from customers: "My relationship with them wasn't just buying and selling, because all commercial relationships are ultimately human relationships."

She felt that while making a living through sales, she was also a buyer in life, so she frequently thought from buyers' perspectives. One day browsing platform forums, Qian Ge accidentally saw a help post from a buyer wanting normal returns but receiving the fake address "Emperor Qianlong, Forbidden City, Beijing" from a seller. Since platforms hadn't yet introduced delivery services or one-click returns, buyers needing returns had to confirm specific pickup points before shipping. This essentially meant seller refusal of returns and refunds. Qian Ge became very angry after seeing this: "That seller was terrible - business doesn't exist but integrity does. I'll help you return it." As a fellow seller, she knew that according to platform rules, if seller address errors caused package returns, all risks should be borne by sellers. She contacted her courier company to help the buyer obtain evidence. The platform determined the seller provided incorrect addresses causing return failure and returned payments to the buyer.

The buyer was very moved and wanted to give Qian Ge gifts or compensation. Qian Ge told her: "If you really want to do something, buy some food for the courier. I just moved my mouth, but he actually did the work."

**Traffic "Involution"**

As e-commerce shifted to mobile, Baobao discovered platform management rules became cumbersome and complex: "These regulations link to traffic - non-compliance results in point and fee deductions."

"Points" refer to product information quality scores, platform mechanisms promoting merchant honest operations. Quality scores mainly assess product quality, logistics speed, and service guarantees, directly linking to search, recommendations, marketing, and advertising, with buyers able to directly view shop scores.

Beyond quality scores, advertising traffic became important factors affecting shop traffic. As platform profit models, merchants bid for keyword rankings, displaying products at search result tops. Meanwhile, recommendation algorithms began widespread application in shopping scenarios - now "Double 11" achieves personalized algorithm delivery across almost all event venues and products.

On one hand, these mechanisms indeed increased store exposure. Paopao and Yiyi, original design women's clothing shop owners, have been operating for three years, spending around 9,000 yuan monthly on platform advertising. While final conversion rates aren't stable, they believe "it's definitely better than not paying for traffic - money spent has value."

On the other hand, traffic involution intensifies. In 2023, original design women's clothing shop owner ANTI shared silk scarf camisoles on Xiaohongshu, unexpectedly attracting netizens who love unique designs. To date, her shop has accumulated 50,000-60,000 followers. To gain more exposure, she tried traffic promotion, but costs exceeded expectations. She said Xiaohongshu traffic costs 1,000 yuan daily to "burn," while Taobao has lower promotion thresholds "but it's unlimited. You sell 100,000, spend tens of thousands on promotion, subtract other costs and barely anything remains" - traffic becomes increasingly expensive. "Finally, when everyone promotes traffic, it's equivalent to no one promoting traffic," ANTI said.

Qian Ge shares similar feelings: "Whether orders convert or not, clicking pages requires advertising fees. Some larger merchants even burn money to defeat competitors, then raise prices - like battlefields."

Baobao discovered that under such intense competition, small sellers who initially competed with her gradually disappeared from platforms.

Qian Ge struggled to adapt and questioned traffic competition value: "I lack this energy and don't want more investment here. I think if you invest operating costs, this ultimately transfers to consumers."

She decided to abandon traffic promotion, with shop daily traffic dropping from "ten thousand" to "one to two thousand."

**Imbalance**

Intense competition spawned traffic mechanisms and imbalanced return/refund rules. Recently, buyer-seller disagreements over returns/refunds increased, with return/exchange behavior boundaries widely discussed online.

Most controversial was buyer "refund-only" mechanisms - consumers applying for refunds without returns, introduced by Amazon in 2017. In 2021, Pinduoduo introduced "refund-only" in fresh produce, initially aimed at reducing after-sales pressure, combating bad merchants, and improving consumer shopping experiences.

In 2023, Chinese online shopping users reached 915 million, with e-commerce entering inventory era. According to major platform financial reports, Taobao added 5.12 million new merchants, JD's third-party merchant numbers increased 188% year-over-year, while Pinduoduo's total merchants reached 8.6 million. Intense traffic competition forced platform reforms until late 2023, when mainstream e-commerce platforms including Taobao, JD, and Douyin successively applied "refund-only" rules.

Convenient return/exchange rules and continuous promotional activities accelerated online shopping, drawing merchants and courier services into speed competitions.

During this year's "618," ANTI felt exhausted as usual during major promotions. She was again penalized by platforms for failing to ship within 48 hours. She attributed slow shipping mainly to insufficient inventory. Small merchants like her struggle to predict order volumes for each product, making each new product inventory preparation like gambling, because "for merchants, inventory represents costs. Once stocked, cash flow freezes."

Under competitive pressure, more small merchants chose to reduce production costs. Upon delivery, buyers faced more situations where goods didn't match descriptions. Buyers Zheng Li and Ke Yu mentioned identical product promotional images made it difficult to distinguish original shops, easily leading to accidental purchases of inferior goods.

Additionally, Zheng Li discovered that despite researching social media guides and participating in multiple livestream events, calculated shopping unit prices showed promotional prices barely differed from regular prices. Now, she no longer creates shopping guides or participates in major promotions.

Fast pace further elevated return rates. Women's clothing sellers Paopao and Yiyi mentioned their shop return/exchange rate around 40%, with industry average around 50%. Baobao also found her shop return/exchange rate rose from initial 17% to 45%. She analyzed this occurred "because it's very convenient - many people don't even carefully read text descriptions." Now, few people actively consult her about products; everyone quickly places orders then returns/refunds.

She also felt rules tilted toward buyers. Unknown when, buyer refunds no longer required video or photo evidence, allowing arbitrary return/refund reasons. Once after receiving goods, she discovered shoes were not only messily packed but damaged. Baobao said she tried appealing to platform representatives, calling over 40 times, but always receiving robot responses. When she finally tried contacting the representative who handled this order, she discovered a newcomer answered, learning the original representative had left. She abandoned appeals and the matter went unresolved.

Qian Ge had similar experiences. Last May, a buyer submitted return/refund requests one month after purchasing bracelets, citing dislike of products. During the first application, the buyer hoped to waive return shipping fees, which Qian Ge refused. During the buyer's second application, the platform bypassed both parties and directly executed refund-only. Receiving this message while touring Kaifeng and standing in Bao Gong Temple, she experienced tremendous absurdity.

E-commerce platform return/refund policy legality derives from the "Consumer Rights Protection Law of the People's Republic of China." Article 25 states online shopping consumers enjoy "seven-day no-reason return rights," with returns/refunds requiring intact goods. According to Article 32 of the "E-commerce Law of the People's Republic of China," "refund-only" as "platform service agreements and trading rules" should be executed by "e-commerce platform operators following open, fair, and just principles."

Facing injustice, Qian Ge decided to sue the platform in internet court. This proved a cumbersome process. Taking Taobao as an example, searching keywords on social platforms revealed many experience posts about suing internet courts. The first step required finding Taobao's corresponding company. Due to Alibaba's vast structure, including Taobao (China) Software Co., Ltd., Zhejiang Taobao Network Co., Ltd., and multiple similarly named enterprises, many sellers stopped at lawsuit drafting. During her first attempt, Qian Ge filled incorrect entity information, causing lawsuit failure.

After carefully verifying company names, addresses, and credit codes, Qian Ge not only provided order screenshots and records of "disputes" with buyers but also submitted service contracts, shop opening certificates, and real-name authentication. Then, she spent one to two hours daily researching lawsuit procedures, browsing guides on different platforms, collecting evidence chains, and contacting internet courts.

While awaiting receipt confirmations, Qian Ge still had to communicate with representatives. She discovered representative attitudes now favored buyers more than years ago. The representative handling her order once asked why she as a merchant couldn't take some losses. She found this strange: "Why automatically position buyers as victims? Many small sellers earn little money."

Finally, Qian Ge won the lawsuit, with Taobao advancing refunds. Besides happiness, she wondered what would happen to less persistent sellers.

Seller-buyer relationships were changing. In later shop operations, Baobao never met regular customers again, encountering more "impolite" customers who wanted discounts or price reductions, directly insulting when refused.

In ANTI's view, compared to other platforms, Taobao had more cases of demanding compensation and abuse. Beyond different audience sizes, she attributed this to e-commerce platform ecology: "Taobao has almost no social platform attributes - buyers only place anonymous orders through Wangwang accounts, with most people in shadows expressing malice without restraint."

**The End of "Refund-Only"**

Facing increasingly sharp conflicts, e-commerce platforms attempted various changes. For example, in August 2024, Taobao introduced new regulations: for merchants with comprehensive experience scores ≥4.8, platforms wouldn't actively intervene or support post-receipt refund-only through Wangwang, instead encouraging merchant-consumer negotiations first. Other score ranges received varying degrees of autonomous disposal rights based on experience scores and industry nature - higher experience scores meant greater merchant disposal rights.

In women's clothing shop owners Paopao and Yiyi's impression, under this policy, platforms assigned dedicated representatives to coordinate damaged returns or overtime return/refund situations, but intervention effects might be limited. When handling one overtime return/refund order, representatives proposed 10% merchant concessions, giving buyers 10% discounts. They readily accepted, feeling "finally rescued." But within two days, representatives still ruled for buyers, directly processing returns/refunds. After failed appeals, Paopao and Yiyi ultimately compromised.

On March 5, 2025, at the first "Ministers' Corridor" during the National People's Congress, State Administration for Market Regulation Director Luo Wen stated this year would focus on optimizing regulatory methods to promote healthy platform economy development. Regarding platform abuse of "refund-only" rules and low-price strategies causing "involution-style competition," they would supervise platforms to regulate related rules and behaviors while ensuring platform fees remain reasonable and transparent, reducing small merchant burdens.

To reverse imbalanced e-commerce environments, on April 22, 2025, five major platforms - Taobao, Pinduoduo, JD, Douyin, and Kuaishou - publicly solicited opinions on "after-sales service rules," indicating platforms would not actively intervene in consumer "refund-only" applications, leaving merchants to handle independently. JD explicitly implemented new regulations from April 30, with Taobao gradually implementing from July.

Less than a month after announcing "refund-only" cancellations, Taobao launched new function testing, allowing apparel merchants to block abnormal refund groups and high refund groups (90-day refund rates exceeding Taobao user averages) with one click.

Regarding new regulations, Paopao and Yiyi indicated that while refund-only could be successfully refused, "unreasonable" returns/refunds still existed. During this year's "618" promotion, they encountered 5 "malicious" returns per 100 sales, including overtime returns/exchanges and refund-only.

Buyer-seller relationships sometimes remained tense. They recalled a buyer claiming clothes had body odor and demanding refunds. To verify situations, they proposed buyer returns - if problems existed, they would send replacements with compensation. Buyers felt they were "passing the buck" and shirking responsibility, rejecting this solution. Later, customer service worried about affecting shop ratings and repeatedly apologized. The buyer said, "No need to return - I'll just write bad reviews."

ANTI also mentioned that while buyers could no longer directly select "refund-only" on Xiaohongshu after-sales interfaces, forced refunds through customer service still succeeded: "If they insist on refunds, we must comply, otherwise they give bad reviews."

During this year's "618," ANTI checked refund goods every few hours on Taobao. She told reporters some products had refund-only requests during shipping, requiring merchants to contact customer service for interception and personally contact couriers. Without timely product recovery, platforms still automatically processed refunds, potentially resulting in both money and goods lost.

Refund disputes remained abundant. According to Xiaofei Bao platform data, "618" period accumulated dispute amounts reached 118 million yuan. Among main complaint issues, refund disputes were most prominent at 20.34%; after-sales and false advertising followed at 19.09% and 11.46% respectively.

While struggling with platforms and buyers, Qian Ge often recalled earlier e-commerce environments. As a first-generation shop owner, she held inseparable emotions: "I've always been grateful it allowed me to connect with this larger world from home," but gradually felt disappointed with later imbalanced rules.

Zheng Li and Ke Yu became tired of online shopping, viewing homogenized products on webpages with increasingly fast shopping speeds and shorter durations. Ke Yu mentioned not knowing when independent shops they followed disappeared - some closed, others never restocked, causing deep disappointment.

Last year, after receiving another pair of damaged returned shoes, Baobao felt exhausted. Watching stagnant bank account numbers, she decided to quit. The same year, Qian Ge calculated accounts and discovered shop annual revenue dropped to 10,000-20,000 yuan, deciding to transform.

Young Paopao, Yiyi, and ANTI still handle various challenging orders, with consumer groups still concentrated domestically and platforms remaining first choices. They're also attempting to build independent websites and accounts, hoping someday to reach broader overseas markets. Currently, they continue persisting and waiting.