There are a number of Amazon policy changes coming in the next few months which you need to be aware of.
The Amazon policy changes which will be troublesome and worth noting are VTR and changes to Seller Fulfilled Prime. The good news is quicker claims for lost/damaged inventory and ability for more products to be included in subscribe and save with a discount funded by Amazon.
Amazon Policy Changes – 19th April 2021
Valid Tracking Rate (VTR) policy
Amazon are adding the Valid Tracking Rate (VTR) policy to increase visibility on shipment tracking for customers. For non-prime seller fulfilled orders you are required, during shipping confirmation, to provide the name of the delivery service provider and delivery service you used as well as the valid tracking ID if you used a tracked delivery method.
Also, you are required to reach a 95% Valid Tracking Rate (VTR). Consult the applicable Amazon store policy for detailed information on the respective VTR calculation per store.
We are aware that a number of sellers are worried about how these metrics are negatively impacting their dashboards ahead of enforcement. We have published a Q&A on Amazon VTR, perhaps the most troublesome of the 2021 Amazon Policy Changes.
27th April 2021
FBA lost and damaged inventory reimbursement policy
To simplify the reconciliation process, Amazon are removing the requirement to wait until 30 days after the inventory is misplaced or damaged in an Amazon warehouse to file a claim. With Amazon’s new inventory adjustment report, warehouse lost or damaged inventory adjustments will be reported when they have been reconciled or are eligible for a reimbursement claim. For any warehouse lost or damaged inventory that has not been reimbursed or found, as shown in the inventory adjustment report, you can file a claim with Amazon immediately. If you disagree with Amazon‘s grading of items returned by customers as customer damaged or defective, you will have the ability to submit a claim. In order to file a claim, the disputed item must have been physically returned to you by means of a removal order. We are also updating the language regarding the reimbursement calculation methodology, in order to provide more clarity about how your reimbursements are calculated.
FBA Subscribe & Save policy no longer limited to Brand Registry
Amazon are updating the FBA Subscribe & Save policy to reflect that the enrolment of new products in the programme is no longer limited to brand owners registered in Amazon Brand Registry.
Eligible, replenishable items will be automatically enrolled at a 0% base discount (that is, at no cost to sellers) and Amazon will fund a 5% customer discount for tiered deliveries when customers receive a fixed number of items in one delivery. Sellers who want to fund a customer discount can do so at 5% or 10%, and Amazon will fund an extra 5% under the applicable conditions. Sellers can opt out at any time.
Amazon Renewed Programme Terms
The Amazon Renewed Programme Terms are being updated to reflect the introduction of a fee that applies to Amazon Renewed products as of the 8th of June 2021. Additionally, they are updating the Amazon Renewed performance metrics to ensure the best customer experience.
20th June 2021 (for UK, FR, ES and 26th July 2021 for IT)
Maintain enrolment in Seller Fulfilled Prime policy
Amazon are updating the Maintain enrolment in Seller Fulfilled Prime policy to improve the Prime customer experience. The required cut-off time to maintain eligibility for Seller Fulfilled Prime will be later which may change depending on the Amazon store.
Additionally, for orders on the Amazon UK store, you will be required to use ship methods that support pickups on at least one weekend day (Saturday or Sunday) in order to maintain eligibility for Seller Fulfilled Prime.
4 Responses
These changes would be compatible with an intention by Amazon to reduce the number of ‘small’ retailers on the marketplace.
Bigger retailers will have better capability to arrange 6 or 7 day/week despatch processes and use postal services that can achieve 95% VTR at an economic cost by means of their purchasing power and parcel volume.
If the number of small retailers selling on Amazon were to be reduced, it would also reduce the number of organisations with which Amazon has to interact and to which they provide seller support.
That could reduce Amazon’s cost of supporting its retailing ‘partners’ and cut out the hoards of annoying little sellers who actually might expect help and support whilst contributing relatively little to Amazon’s profits.
I wonder if that might be the driving force behind these changes ?
You missed an important one – they’re going to start removing HTML from listing descriptions, so even if you use simple line breaks to make paragraphs more readable, they’re going to be a jumbled mess.
This is from June 8th.
Changes haha
we are sending items via royal mail tracked and uploading all the information required by Amazon.
Customers then say they do not have the items and we contact royal mail who confirm the item as delivered and the GPS showing the item at scanned at the customers premises.
They then open an A to Z guarantee on Amazon and guess what the tracking is “INSUFFICIENT” according to Amazon and the customer is refunded.
I have made repeated requests to amazon now to clarify what is a sufficient tracked service and guess what? “Yep no reply”
So i think i may start a new business ordering items from Amazon and making false claims it would be a very ludicrous business and also a great way to do xmas shopping.
So does anyone have any information as to what is a sufficient tracked service to suit Amazon.
Or should we just do cheap and use the saved money to stand the refunds.
@mark “So does anyone have any information as to what is a sufficient tracked service to suit Amazon.”
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We have learnt a lot about using Amazon Buy Shipping over recent weeks and by all accounts if you purchase postage via Buy Shipping it puts you in a much stronger position to defend A-Z claims and refund claims. I would therefore advise you to read the help pages, seller forums and contact support to confirm if it would be a good choice for yourself.