We’ve discussed zombie debt, zombie bills, and zombie accounts, and even zombie retail on this site before, but we had never heard of zombie returned merchandise…until now. Reader Michael reports that he returned something to Amazon in March 2013, received a refund, and that was the end of the story. Until it wasn’t the end of the story.

Is this happening to other people? Maybe, maybe not, but it’s a good reminder to watch over your account statements and any stray e-mails that come in from retailers. What you ignore as a coupon or sale announcement might actually be a zombification.

He writes:

I just got an email from Amazon saying that I hadn’t returned something that I sent back in March, 2013. And so, the email said, they just charged me for it again. Had I missed this email, I would have been charged for something that was returned almost two months ago.

So I went onto Amazon.com and looked at my returns and tracked the package, which was sent back to them using a label they provided. The tracking information confirmed it had been delivered back in March.

But it turns out their system didn’t recognize that it was returned, even though it was sent back using their provided label and the tracking information indicated it had been delivered. I chatted with them about it, and the support guy said “somehow this is been an on going problem and we have escalated this to our IT team to make sure that his error will be straighten out.”

Has this happened to you with Amazon, or with any other online retailer? We want to hear about it. Contact us at tips@consumerist.com.

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