As the e-commerce market in Southeast Asia continues to heat up, the platform's requirements for after-sales experience and performance capabilities are also increasing. Recently, TikTok Shop's cross-border business in Southeast Asia announced that it will officially upgrade the return process from the beginning of March 2026, comprehensively canceling the long-standing "no local return warehouse" setting option. This adjustment means that cross-border merchants will fully enter the "localized processing" era in the after-sales link.

According to the official announcement of TikTok Shop, after the new rules take effect, Southeast Asian cross-border merchants must complete the return plan configuration within the time specified by the platform and choose one of the following three return modes:

First,use the merchant's own local return warehouse. This solution is suitable for sellers who have a certain scale and have laid out overseas warehouses or local warehouses in Southeast Asia, and can handle returns, secondary sales or inventory turnover on their own.

Second,sign a contract with the platform's officially certified warehouse. Merchants can cooperate with third-party warehousing service providers recognized by TikTok Shop, and the certified warehouse will undertake the return reception and basic processing functions, which is more guaranteed in terms of compliance and stability.

Third,join the "TikTok Shop Designated Local Return Warehouse". This option will become the default option for merchants who have not completed the configuration or actively choose to give up the product processing rights.

The platform clearly states that if the merchant does not complete the return address setting within the prescribed time limit, the system will automatically default it to the third option.

In this rule adjustment, the change that attracts the most attention from sellers is reflected in the handling method of returned products.

If the merchant chooses or is automatically assigned by the system to the "TikTok Shop Designated Local Return Warehouse" plan, the products returned by consumers will be uniformly discarded or destroyed by the platform, and the merchant will not be able to recover the goods, nor will there be the possibility of secondary sales. This mechanism objectively simplifies the return link, but it also means that the product cost will be directly digested by the seller.

In terms of freight responsibility division, the new rules also make clear distinctions:

• Buyer's Responsibility Return (such as seven-day no reason, etc.), the related return freight is borne by the platform;

• Merchant's Responsibility Return (such as product quality, description does not match, etc.), the return freight still needs to be borne by the merchant.

For some categories with low customer unit price and return cost significantly higher than the product value, TikTok Shop specifically suggests in the announcement that merchants can discretionarily enable the "Refund Only, No Return" function to avoid high cross-border logistics or local processing costs.

This suggestion is also interpreted by the industry as the platform guiding sellers to finely calculate after-sales costs, and flexibly choose a more suitable after-sales strategy according to product pricing, profit margin and return probability.

It is understood that this is part of TikTok Shop Southeast Asia's continuous strengthening of performance and service standards in 2026. Previously, the platform has gradually tightened the delivery time limit, adjusted the margin policy, and vigorously supported top merchants. This return rule adjustment further indicates that the platform is accelerating from "wild growth" to "high-quality, sustainable growth" stage.