管科系系列讲座第240期预告

时　间：2019年9月19日（周四）10:00

地　点：思源楼524

主持人：戴悦教授（复旦大学商务决策与运营分析研究中心）

主讲嘉宾：Chen Jian is Lenovo Chair professor at the Department of Management Science and Engineering in the School of Economics and Management, Tsinghua Univeristy. 

Title：Signaling Quality with Return Insurance: Theory and Empirical Evidence

Abstract: This paper examines an innovative return policy, return insurance, emerging on various shopping platforms such as Taobao.com and JD.com. Return insurance is underwritten by an insurer and can be purchased by either a retailer or a consumer. Under such insurance, the insurer partially compensates consumers for their hassle cost associated with product return. We analyze the informational role of return insurance when product quality is the retailer’s private information, consumers infer quality from the retailer’s price and insurance adoption, and the insurer strategically chooses insurance premiums. We show that return insurance can be an effective signal of high quality. When consumers have little confidence about high quality and expect a significant gap between high and low qualities, a high-quality retailer differentiates itself from a low-quality retailer solely through its adoption of return insurance. We confirm, both analytically and empirically with a data set consisting of over 1,000 sellers on JD.com, that return insurance is more likely adopted by higher-quality sellers under information asymmetry. Furthermore, compared to free return (i.e., retailers directly compensate for consumers’ product-return hassles), return insurance is a stronger signal of quality, due to the role of the third party, the insurer. Despite its capability to signal quality, return insurance is costly for the retailer. Particularly, both high-quality and low-quality retailers are sometimes strictly worse off due to the option of purchasing insurance. Nevertheless, return insurance can improve consumer surplus and reduce product returns. Its profit advantage to the insurer is most pronounced under significant information asymmetry.

管理科学系

2019-9-9