Fingers crossed we won't get banned for accepting too many samples!
Do This Too Much at Costco, and You Might Get Banned for Life
Updated on Jul. 30, 2025
Step into a Costco warehouse, and you’ve got everything you need for survival: groceries, clothes, flowers, electronics and more. You could live off the land inside the store for a good, long while. Of course, attempting to set up shop there and ignoring repeated calls for store closing could certainly be grounds to get you banned from Costco for life. But that’s not the only thing that’ll get you the boot.
Because, yes, while Costco is generally considered the G.O.A.T. for its low prices and extended gas station hours, even it has its limits. So while it’s pretty dang difficult to get banned from Costco, try hard enough, and you can do it. Particularly if you engage in one very specific behavior.
Once you’re on the list, there isn’t a Costco membership level that will get you back in those doors—nope, not even Executive. Read on to find out what behavior will get you banned, and why.
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What frequent behavior will get you banned for life at Costco?
To put it simply: too many returns. Yes, Costco has an incredible return policy. And yes, it wants its members to be happy enough to come back again and again (and pay that annual membership fee). But return abuse is still return abuse, and it costs retailers like Costco a lot of money.
In fact, according to Appriss Retail, which provides retail abuse and fraud prevention services to businesses, companies lost a collective $103 billion to fraudulent and abusive returns in 2024 alone. Considering Costco is already sucking it up by making its $4.99 rotisserie chicken a massive loss leader, it doesn’t want to lose even more money on shifty returns.
Why are regular returns a red flag?
When we say “frequent returns,” we mean really frequent. As in multiple times per week.
“There are definitely patterns that should raise red flags,” says Monica Eaton, founder and CEO of Chargebacks911. “Members who make frequent returns (think multiple times per week) or who return a high percentage of their total purchases may get marked as suspicious. The same goes for returning incomplete products while keeping valuable components, like remotes or cables, or returning clothes that have clearly been worn (a practice known as wardrobing).”
Eaton notes that Costco might be especially wary regarding high-value electronics. “It’s not uncommon for people to repeatedly buy and return electronics after extended use,” she says.
What is Costco’s return policy?
Costco is known for its “risk-free, 100% satisfaction guarantee” return policy. However, electronics and major appliances must be returned within 90 days of receipt of the merchandise. Products deemed to have a “limited life expectancy,” like batteries and tires, are also sold with a time-limited warranty for returns. Airline tickets and tickets to live events are also ineligible for returns.
Fortunately, Costco keeps customer receipts for up to two years to make it super easy to return products. But in return, the company expects discretion when making a return. Generally speaking, customers know when they are taking advantage of the system.
How often is too often when it comes to returns?
For Costco, this is a little tricky. Pedro Ramos, Appriss Retail’s chief revenue officer, explains why. “Club stores face unique challenges due to their membership model and bulk purchasing behaviors, which demand a more nuanced approach to fraud prevention,” Ramos says. “A positive returns experience can drive 70% of shoppers to become repeat customers, but a single negative interaction can drive 30% away for good.”
This becomes a high-stakes equation when customers pay a membership fee to shop, as they do at Costco. Ramos says retailers must strike the right balance between preventing abuse and keeping high-value club members happy.
“This is where AI and behavioral analytics are essential, helping identify real abuse without mistakenly flagging loyal members,” he says.
What about returning used goods?
@addison.beth we broke married kids love your return policy @Costco Wholesale 🫶🏼 #costco #costcotiktok #lifehack #married #newlyweds ♬ original sound – Addison Marriott
Costco wants to maintain the trust of its members so that they keep renewing their club membership. With that in mind, if you’ve used a product and found that it is faulty, wore out quickly or is just flat out not good quality, the store will take it back, no questions asked.
However, there are increasingly more, shall we say, sketchy returns of used goods that are really testing the limits of Costco’s good graces. And though people are largely able to make these returns without penalty, and they technically fall within Costco’s generous return policy, they’re still morally questionable.
Take, for example, a young couple who proudly posted a TikTok with the hashtag “lifehack.” The video shows them in the fall brazenly returning an air conditioning unit purchased at the beginning of the summer, along with the commentary that “it’s the greatest heist in human history.” Was anything wrong with the AC unit? Nope. They simply had no need for it now that the temps had cooled, so back to the warehouse it went for a full refund.
Then there’s 20-something YouTuber Parker Seidelwho made an ongoing bit of returning things to Costco—like three-week-old cut flowers that he never once put in water. (Honestly, if you expect cut flowers to still be fresh as the day you purchased them after three weeks, even in water, we need to talk.)
How many people does Costco ban a year?
This information isn’t publicly available, but the cases of getting banned are likely few and far between. “As a rule, Costco tries to avoid going to extreme measures like this,” Eaton says. “But blatant and proactive return fraud is probably your best bet if you’re trying to get banned. This includes trying to return stolen goods or using doctored receipts to try to return items for more than was originally paid.”
A scan of Reddit’s Costco threads uncovered a few stories of members getting banned for life, though typically for rather illegal wrongdoings. For example, one Redditor who works at Costco recalls a man who purchased a membership only to immediately start causing a scene in the warehouse, disturbing employees and other customers. He was banned “immediately.”
Another shared a ban that essentially amounts to stealing. “I remember a story here of someone returning some kind of alcohol (wine or liquor), and it was mostly water,” said the Reddit poster. “Costco employees tested it, and the customer was banned for life.”
What other behaviors might get you banned from Costco?
Costco does not play around when it comes to being an upstanding member of their warehouse club.
“Managers have discretion to revoke memberships,” Eaton says. “Though they generally try to avoid doing this, customers who have an established pattern of systematically exploiting Costco policies will probably see consequences at some point.”
- Being rude to staff. “Getting aggressive or threatening employees over return disputes is another possibility [for a ban],” she says. “For instance, say an employee rejects your return request and you start to yell and threaten them. This could very easily result in a ban.”
- Breaking warehouse club rules. “Letting non-household members use your membership card, for instance, or buying items in bulk for commercial resale without a business membership, could be problematic,” Eaton says. “Even filling an unauthorized container at the gas pump or leaving a pump unattended while filling your tank are both violations of Costco rules.”
- Helping yourself to a discount. “Any kind of fraud or criminal behavior could result in a ban,” she says. “For example, eating food while in the store, then refusing to pay for it, attempting to use expired coupons or switching price tags.”
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Sources:
- Monica Eaton, CEO and founder of Chargebacks911
- Pedro Ramos, chief revenue officer of Appriss Retail
- Appriss Retail: “2024 Consumer Returns in the Retail Industry”
- Reddit: “Costco lifetime ban stories”
- TikTok: “The Ultimate Life Hack for Newlyweds”
- YouTube: “I Tested Out Costco’s Return Policy”
