Presently in China (driven by a lack of trust.) you do not pay for an item until it is received and inspected by you. The culture that created this may be mistrust but it has the potential to upset every retailer in America. If you have the choice to purchase the exact same item from two vendors and one says pay for everything now and one says pay only after you have received the product – which do you choose?
The distrust arises from some companies delivering ‘Knock-offs’ that look very similar to the real thing but don’t work. On top of that… Once they have the product they are merciless to the merchant. Any flaw and they refuse to pay. This usually results in the vendor shipping a second item for free to get paid for the first item. The consumer is allowed to keep both which promotes more complaints with the next order to get more ‘free’ products.
It is a vicious cycle that only a culture of trust can break. (That will take another decade at least.)
So, will Alibaba introduce Americans to the ‘Pay later, complain often and get more stuff’ mentality?
