There has been another fire at the Amazon Rugeley Fulfilment centre in the UK. This time, according to reports, the centre was evacuated at just after noon on Saturday and Staffordshire fire crews attended the scene. The blaze is being treated as suspicious by the authorities.
Although stock was damaged it seems that the fabric of the building is unharmed which hopefully means it can start operating again unhindered soon. Fire Investigation Officer Carl Mason from Staffordshire Fire Service says: “This was quite a large scale incident which took several hours to deal with due to the type of materials inside the building and the level of smoke logging which took significant time to ventilate.”
Local media said: “Dozens of firefighters were involved in tackling the blaze with ten sent in wearing breathing apparatus to get close enough to quell the flames. The blaze involved a large amount of goods which were well alight when the crews arrived. The fire spread in the large distribution centre as it prepares for its busiest time of the year during the run up to Christmas.”
Needless to say, the good news seems to be that nobody was hurt in this fire. But there are business considerations too. This will be of concern to any seller who holds stock in FBA at Rugeley. Has Amazon been in touch with you giving any information? It could potentially be a headache for many thousands of sellers.
It’s only about a year since a similar fire incident occurred at the Amazon Rugeley fulfilment centre. We wrote about it at the time here.
And we remember from 2016, that it it took quite a long time for Amazon to come clean about the level of the damage, clarify with sellers what stock had been damaged or destroyed and then provide compensation. We hope that will show greater alacrity on this occasion.
Indeed, we can only assume that every seller holding stock with FBA at Rugeley was adequately recompensed in the end in 2016. It would be interesting to hear if you were affected last time and did indeed get what was due in compo in the end. Or not? What was your experience?
6 Responses
If they pay staff properly this wouldn’t happen.
They treat sellers bad
They treat their workers bad
They treat suppliers bad
They destroy local businesses
Has a customer i am happy with the service but has a seller not so happy
We need a regulator to manage all marketplaces because so many businesses depend on them.
Just received the following email:
Dear seller,
Following an operational incident in one of our Fulfilment Centers, some of your items may have been damaged. While we work to confirm the condition of all the items affected, some of them will be in reserved condition. Once they have been reviewed they will either become available to customers again or will be reimbursed as per the standard FBA Lost and Damaged Inventory Reimbursement Policy.
We recognize you may be concerned about customers being able to purchase your items, especially at this time. We are actively working to ensure that your inventory is available for sale to customers as quickly as possible.
We are sorry for the inconvenience.
This is a no-reply email, your message will not be forwarded.
Thank you for using Fulfilment by Amazon
I have thousands of stock in reserve status! No trust in Fulfilment by Amazon!!!
We have 30000 advent calendars now on reserved stock as were all there – same email as above – no recourse – no way of knowing – maybe we won’t be here next year
I worked there for 3 months last year
It is a virtual prison for workers who are pushed to the limit with targets
Would not recommend anyone working there
Jon
Security officer