3 Features Your RMA Solution Should Have (Part 3): Reports

It’s time for the third and final part of this blog series on RMAs. All three of these posts are based on the excellent article from Find Accounting Software.

RMA Recap

I’ve already talked about how important it is for RMAs to be flexible enough to be used for a variety of purposes and in a variety of business types. And I also talked about the need for an RMA solution to integrate with inventory management software, accounting software, and a CRM. This week I will go a step further and explain the practical usefulness of the data and trends that can come from RMAs. Once again, I will focus primarily on Fishbowl’s RMA module.

RMA Reports

Every module in Fishbowl has default reports that can be easily printed out, and the RMA module is no different. These default RMA reports show:

• A list of products being returned on a specific RMA
• A summary of all RMAs that were issued over a certain period of time

With these reports alone, you can see what products are being returned most often. You can then delve deeper into this information to discover the root causes of those returns. If customers are returning a lot of a certain product, you can go through the assembly line for that product to spot areas for improvement. If you get the product from a vendor, you can talk to them about it and try to come to a mutually beneficial resolution. The point is that knowledge is power, and the more data you have on product returns, the better equipped you’ll be to make changes and improve your customers’ experience.

Custom RMA Reports

You can also create custom reports to compile even more information, such as:

• Return rates
• The amount of time it takes to complete an RMA
• How many returns, replacements, substitutions, and repairs you do over a specific time period
• How much each return costs in terms of time, money, and other resources

Fishbowl works with a number of partners that can amplify the functionality of Fishbowl’s reports. So if you’d like to really dig down deep into the data found in the RMA module, you might just find their custom reports particularly helpful.

Conclusion

So there you go. RMAs are not only important tools to help you process product returns, but they can be used to:

• Substitute, replace, or repair products
• Instantly update other software platforms with financial and inventory information when returns are completed
• Organize data on returns in a way that exposes trends and other things that can help reduce return rates

I hope you’ll return to the Fishbowl Blog often for informative content like this.