In the first week of October, one of our Riyadh COD parcels came back. The buyer never refused it — the address was just incomplete.
Saudi Arabia now ties the National Address to the waybill. If a shopper only types "Riyadh, Al Olaya," the system can't generate a 4-digit short code, and the courier marks it failed. Honestly, that's the worst kind of return: nothing wrong with the goods, money burned anyway.
My rule is three steps. Make the 8-digit building number and the 4-digit short code mandatory at checkout — no "add later" loophole. Send the short code back by SMS so buyers verify it themselves; each re-delivery costs about SAR 12-18, and that's pure margin. And stop using free-text address fields — use a dropdown plus a map pin.
Most sellers trip on the template. English and Arabic address fields sit side by side and misalign on export. As far as I know, Riyadh and Jeddah delivery stations have little patience for missing short codes now — first-attempt failure can hit 20% in a single day.
One more thing: the short code and the GPS pin are separate. Code right, pin wrong, still a return. Worth pulling up your address form this week?