Who should bear cost of transporting returned goods?

[Slippy]

Our situation is like this: one of the stores we supply owes us an amount already 6 months late. They've now decided to rather return stock for credit instead of paying, except the stock is distributed nationally across about a dozen stores.
Who should be paying the transport costs of these goods being returned for credit? (we covered the shipping fee to get it them when purchased)

[IanF]

Returning goods after six months, they should pay for transport costs both ways. Some places even charge a restocking fee.
But this depends on how you want the relationship going forward, maybe set out the costs for them and see if they are reasonable and come to an agreement who pays or what share they are prepared to pay.
Also there are all the hidden overheads like interest VAT paid commissions paid etc.

[Slippy]

This is actually to close off the account, there's no moving forwards after this we would normally charge an admin fee on processing stock for credit but not much point in this case.

[adrianh]

What would happen if the stores say tough, if you want it come and get it - what can you do about it?

What I am asking is is this; Is the stock more valueble than the cost of the transport if you were to pay for the transport?
If you pay for the trasport would you be able to recover the cost from the resale of the product?

Many factors to consider...

[Dave A]

They've now decided to rather return stock for credit instead of paying...

If they hope to get credited full value, I should think it reasonable they at least pay the shipping costs.

This one really is full of potential complications, though - particularly if the value of the returned stock does not satisfy the outstanding bill.

[Rongson]

I think it should be your client to pay the transport fee since you already paid when deliver.

But there are still a lot of factors to consider before you to agree upon.