We’re hearing some disturbing stories that Amazon Fulfilment centers are turning away incoming shipments and in some cases moving retailers stock en masse between their different FBA warehouses.
Couriers have cited “rejections, critical delays and the Fulfilment center unable to take freight” as the reason for suspending shipments and at least one courier is temporarily refusing shipments into both Amazon’s Doncaster locations (LBA1 & LBA2) as well as Rugeley (BHX1) and Birmingham (XUKK).
With Black Friday less than a month away, it’s likely that many retailers would be planning to step up pallet shipments into various Amazon fulfilment centers around the country. Delays in accepting incoming loads or outright rejections will result in stock being held by the carrier and either delivered late or returned to the retailer. Plus as well as stock tied up that can’t be sold, there are inevitable costs involved with shipping goods around the country simply to be rejected.
If you are planning to ship FBA stock into Amazon it may well be worth confirming with your chosen carrier if they have experienced any issues or are aware of the possibility of delays getting your products accepted.
7 Responses
2 weeks ago, we discovered 6 weeks of rejected shipments had been accumulating at LBA2 . Apparently, we didn’t get ‘the memo’ to say LBA2 would not take >1.7m.
The Amazon seller support rep apologised.
Today I had planned to replenish the stock through LBA1 – suggestion from rep. Reading this maybe I should think twice.
Ours got all held up from last week, was about 4 days longer than normal. Kinda expected this however. We have most lines in at the start of October as last year was a total shambles.
There is no margin in Amazon anymore anyway so we are not going again with them till after PEAK now, unless all the other channels totally implode.
I would be interested to know the experience of FBA sellers wrt FBA receiving inventory. I have noticed a dramatic decline in reconciled shipments.
We go to great lengths to ensure shipments are correctly labelled and we send exactly what is reflected in the SC shipment, no more, no less. Yet we get pinged on every shipment for ‘unexpected items’ and then a month* later end up with ‘missing items’ requiring an investigation. Why? Because the ‘system’ allocates inventory to the wrong shipment. We’ve tried sending fewer orders of bigger quantities but it’s all the same.
*2 weeks sitting on a dock + 2 weeks required before an investigation can be requested. Oh, an allow 2-4 weeks for a (low level) seller support rep to pick up the case. Mind you, I will get email updates most days reassuring me they have not forgotten my case – I’ve learned to scan these templates of sincerity, apology and encouragement at speed but always bemused by the logic and only guessing at the metrics that drive this noise.
They are a shambles at the moment as a brief look at any FBA forum / facebook group confirms this.
Ditto – 1000’s items in reserve
On top of the repercussions of LBA2 not receiving items > 1.7m with no warning and no alternative, this has been a very disappointing season.
Just noticed A+ comment: Ditto to “A lot of blocked ASINs because of unexpected inventory or additional quantities.”
As with A+, I know 95%+ of these are due to Amazon allocating inventory to the wrong shipment and then pinging us for making a mistake and leaving a comment (insult to injury):
“It is important that you make sure the physical items you send to Amazon match the ASIN listed in the shipping plan when you create a shipment. Correctly matching UPC/EAN/JANs or other external barcodes to ASINs is an effective way to reduce shipment errors. ”
whereas, it should be the seller leaving the comment:
“It is important that you make sure the physical items we send to Amazon match the correct shipping plan when you receive a shipment.”