We’ve seen a copy of an email from Amazon suggesting that between 8th of September 2016 and the 11th of January 2017 the wrong fees were charged for items sold in the Electronics Accessories Categories.
Amazon’s Seller Referral Fees for that category should be 12%, but we understand they were incorrectly charged at just 7% for four months. Amazon have been billing the correct 12% from the 12th of January 2017. This means that sellers may have been undercharged by 5% on all their sales for four months and three days.
If this is correct, Amazon are expected to email sellers by the end of February to inform them how much was undercharged and send bills for the amount they say is due. If you owe any money it will appear in the Transaction View of your Payments Report as a “non-subscription fee adjustment” under the transaction type “Other.”
If you are affected and have underpaid then potentially you’re about to receive an unexpected and pretty hefty bill, 5% of everything you sold in the Electronics Accessories Categories for four months including Q4 which is traditionally the busiest time of the year.
Have you received an email notification saying that you might (almost certainly) owe a substantial amount of fees to Amazon. Will you be able to afford to pay the bill when it arrives? How will this affect your business?
7 Responses
I’m not an amazon seller, but two things suck about this “undercharging”, following on from Ebay’s own version last year.
Firstly, these companies make vast sums off sellers. Given that the mistake is theirs, they should be magnanimous and waive these charges, especially as they are due to their own internal errors.
Secondly, are these companies going to be as forthright in putting it right when they overcharge customers? My experience on Ebay, where subtle overcharging of small sums has become the norm, makes me doubt they would be honest enough to do that.
Surely Amazon and Ebay should perceive the good PR of not pursuing these undercharging errors.
Or is it really only about the $$$$$$
If as a marketplace seller on Amazon, I undercharged my customers and pursued them later for any shortages, Amazon would expect me to absorb loss and not affect the end customer’s buying experience….
It would be very hypercritical of Amazon if they were to pursue sellers for any shortages which was their own fault
Now I dont think I am too badly affected by this in terms of back charges , but just noticed this morning that Amazon have changed 25 of my Consumer electronics items to 12% from 7% ,
They actually are consumer electronics items so should be on the 7% rate , some if not most listed for well over a year .
Just something for the readers to watch out for .
Well I never understand what on earth is going on at Amazon. For some reason they have refunded me 3 x £30 Subscription Fee Adjustment this morning. Have they got rid of Subscription FEES or something