Ninety Days Is the Headline. There Are at Least Four Other Clocks.

A department store return policy that opens with 90 days contains at least four other windows, two categories that cannot come back at all, and a pair of 25% fees. What to read before you order.

A return policy that opens with ninety days sounds settled, and for most of a department store’s catalogue it is. The interesting part is underneath. Boscov’s publishes its full policy rather than a summary, and reading it end to end turns up at least four other clocks, two categories that cannot come back at all, and a pair of 25% fees that are not described as return fees. None of that is hidden — but none of it is in the headline either.

Key facts

• The general window is 90 days from purchase, with the original packing slip and all merchandising tags attached
• Returns go back by post or to any Boscov’s store, and in store you can arrange an exchange — except on online-exclusive items
• Jewellery and watches: 30 days, with a receipt and in original condition and packaging
• Patio furniture: 30 days — and no patio returns at all after 30 August, whenever it was bought
• Monogrammed merchandise cannot be returned. Sauder furniture cannot be returned once it is, or has been, assembled
• Special orders carry a 25% cancellation fee plus a pick-up fee; non-defective Sauder returns carry a 25% cancellation fee and need a Return Authorisation number
• Shipping fees are not refunded, and you arrange the return carriage yourself unless the item arrived damaged or wrong
• Allow up to 10 days from receipt for a return to be processed

In the US, the posted policy is the entitlement

This matters more than shoppers assume, because American retail does not work the way European retail does. There is no federal right to return something because you changed your mind. Federal law obliges a seller to put things right when goods are defective or the contract is breached, not when you have gone off the colour.

The FTC’s Cooling-Off Rule is the exception people half-remember, and it is narrower than its reputation: three days, on sales of $25 or more made away from the seller’s normal place of business — trade shows, conventions, in-home sales. It explicitly does not apply to sales made entirely online.

State law mostly regulates disclosure rather than the right itself. In California and New York, a retailer must post its policy, and a store that does not post one can be required to accept returns within 30 days. So the posted policy is not a floor sitting above some larger statutory right. It is the whole of what you have, which is exactly why its exceptions are worth a minute of reading.

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The headline window, and the conditions attached to it

Ninety days is generous by department-store standards, and it applies to merchandise bought on the site returned within that window with the original packing slip and all merchandising tags attached. You can post it back or carry it into any store, and in store you can swap it rather than refund it — unless it is an online-exclusive item, where exchange is not offered.

Two details sit just under that and cost real money. Shipping fees are not refunded, so the postage you paid to get the parcel is gone whatever happens next. And the policy tells you to take the package to the shipping provider of your choice, which means the return carriage is yours to arrange and pay for — with the exception of an item that arrives damaged, where the policy is explicit that there is no cost to you.

Processing takes up to ten days from the day the return is received, so the money is not instant even when everything goes right.

Four other clocks

The ninety days is a default, not a universal. The exceptions are specific enough to be worth memorising if you shop across categories.

• Jewellery and watches — 30 days, with a receipt, in original condition with original packaging and tags.
• Patio furniture — 30 days, with all parts and the original packaging. And a second, stranger limit: no returns accepted after 30 August. That is a calendar date, not a countdown, so late-season patio buying quietly shortens your window to nothing.
• Monogrammed merchandise — never. If it arrives damaged or defective it goes back to the vendor for replacement, not to the store.
• Assembled Sauder furniture — never. The policy says it may not be returned if it is, or has been, assembled, which puts the decision before the Allen key rather than after it.

Mattresses and box springs are a separate route again: they are covered by the manufacturer’s warranty, and a warranty exchange is authorised only after the bedding has been inspected and found defective. Area rugs need a Return Merchandise Authorisation number before they travel. Gift cards are not returnable and not redeemable for cash.

💍 Check the category rules before you add to basket

The fees that are not called return fees

Two 25% charges sit in the furniture sections, and neither is described as a restocking fee in the headline sense.

Special orders are subject to a 25% cancellation fee as well as a pick-up fee, and fabric and leather treatment services are not refundable at all. Non-defective Sauder returns are assessed a 25% cancellation fee and require a Return Authorisation number obtained by phone; the customer arranges and pays for return shipping, or carries it to a store. Where the wrong merchandise was sent, the fee does not apply.

On a $600 special-order sofa, a change of mind is a $150 decision before anybody has moved the furniture. That is not unusual for special orders across the industry. It is unusual to be able to read it in advance.

There is no exchange by post

If you want a different size or colour and you are not near a store, the policy is direct about it: return the merchandise for credit to the original form of payment and place a new order. There is no swap in the post.

That is the same structure most retailers now use, and it has the same consequence — the second order is a second set of shipping fees, and the first set is not coming back. Ordering two sizes intending to return one is a more expensive habit here than it looks.

A five-minute check before you order

1. Identify the category before the price: general, jewellery and watches, patio, furniture, bedding, monogrammed. They are governed differently.
2. Read the product description for “Online Only” — some of those items are not returnable, or cannot be returned to a store, and the policy says this is stated on the product page.
3. Keep the packing slip. It is named in the policy, not optional.
4. Work out your nearest store. Carrying a return in avoids the postage and makes an exchange possible.
5. Treat monogramming and assembly as the point of no return, because in both cases they literally are.
6. On a special order, decide before you sign. The 25% applies whether or not anything has been made.

The short version

Ninety days is real, and for clothes and homeware it is the whole story. Everything that goes wrong sits in the categories where the number changes: jewellery at thirty, patio at thirty with a calendar wall in front of it, monogramming and assembly at zero, and special orders at a quarter of the price. In a country where the posted policy is the entitlement rather than a bonus on top of one, that fine print is not fine print. It is the policy.

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Sources: Boscov’s return policy · Boscov’s returns and exchanges help centre · Cornell Legal Information Institute, the FTC Cooling-Off Rule · FindLaw, customer returns and refund laws by state